


UF Origins -- Season 1, Episode 3: Case Armageddon!

by Turandokht, Voyager989



Series: UF Origins [4]
Category: Babylon 5 & Related Fandoms, Mass Effect - All Media Types, Multi-Fandom, Original Work, Star Trek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2018-12-01
Packaged: 2019-08-28 10:23:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 45,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16721523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Turandokht/pseuds/Turandokht, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Voyager989/pseuds/Voyager989





	1. Chapter 1

**_Introduction_ **

“I still do not understand why you insisted on dragging me here, Nah’dur. The replicator already has so _many_ options…” Fei’nur’s voice had almost a hint of a planitive sound to it as she glanced about the room, almost disturbingly large for a warship.

“Yes, but it’s a chance for us to _socialise._ Together. In public. Also, this woman cooks authentic Bulgarian food,” Nah’dur answered eagerly, traipsing up to the bar, which was finished with freshly planed lumber from Drachenfeldt, as were the barstools. The lights were dim, to accentuate the local pub atmosphere and make stargazing better, since of course the Café Varna was one of the only places on the ship with real windows (Prifly, the astrogation domes, and a couple of hangar control stations being the others).

The woman behind the counter was Alexandra herself, dressed in traditional Bulgarian national costume. She came over promptly, carrying a basket, which she slammed onto the bar. It was filled with breaded whole little fishes which immediately smelled _utterly delicious;_ one thing that replicators had real (rather than imagined) trouble with was the taste of deep fried food fresh out of the deep fryer. “Fish.” She looked at the two Dilgar woman, insisting on using her own voice and the English she’d started to learn instead of a universal translator. “Dilgar like fish. Order beers? Bourgas 63?”

“Yes, I’ll have some _rakija,_ ” Nah’dur answered, and picked up one of the fish carcasses. The deep-fryed sprat melted in her mouth, and her eyes lit up in delight at the flavour, leaving her to exhale in happiness. “Now that’s _good,_ Fei’nur, try it.”

Fei’nur gave Nah’dur a look, and picked up one of them carefully, throwing it back with a wary expression, before her face _lit_ with delight. “This is just like karfi back home! A beer, yes, strongest you have!” With the smile still plastered on her face, she went for another, looking all together more carefree than Nah’dur had ever seen her.

“Good,” Alexandra answered. “Menus.” She tossed them on the ample bar in front of the two women, and headed off to get their drinks.

“So this is kind of like karfi?” Nah’dur asked, fascinated.

A moment later, Alexandra deposited their beer and a brandy snifter-sized glass of clear liquid, before heading back into the kitchen to deal with someone else’s order.

“A bit. Somewhat less salty, there was something in the sauce back home it doesn’t _quite_ capture, but it’s closer than anything I thought I’d taste again!”

“That’s so nifty. It’s always made me sad to think we’ve lost the flavours of Omelos.” She ate a few more, smiling, and trying her rakija. Dilgar had been drinkers _before_ Omelos was destroyed, a lot of the survivors had become functional alcoholics since then, though Dilgar were somewhat more resistant to alcoholism as a disease that destroyed functionality than humans, they also tended to be more susceptible to coping through it. Nah’dur knew all of this and didn’t really care, it tasted good.

The menus laid out before them offered an immense selection of meat. Meat plates. Fish plates. _‘Meat kompot’._ Shashlik.

Fei’nur knew that this would be both disastrous for her needs to exercise _and_ her flexible spending account… and right now, she didn’t care, as she looked for whatever plate offered her the best variety and largest total portion.

“Look, there’s a meat _plank,_ ” Nah’dur pointed on the menu. “I’m going to try, uhh, …”

“Plank. Gods, this _is_ just like when we blew the Emperor’s Birthday bonus pay on leave that one year....”

“Plank?” Alexandra heard them and came over with a pad for taking down their orders. “You order the meat plank?” She asked Fei’nur.

“ _Yes_.” The grizzled Colonel replied with a wide, almost child-like grin. “And another beer.”

“Good.” A baleful eye looked to the much smaller Dilgar woman. “Eat more meat? Grow? Yes?”

“Uhh, yes! Kebapche.”

“Kebapche. Good.” Satisfied, Alexandra wandered back to the kitchen.

“...Worth it, Fei’nur?” Nah’dur looked satisfied, and not at all bothered by the terse proprietor.

“Depends on the slab.” Fei’nur winked and sipped at her glass again. “We’d need more concrete to get a bar on Omelos, back then. Too much metal for where I grew up.” She paused, for a moment. “Also too much meat, to be honest.”

“Nobody could afford it in the old Empire days. Well, mother did growing up, but that was a special case.”

“Your mother’s clan _owned a meat-processing and ranching conglomerate.”_ The _look_ that Nah’dur got in turn matched the sarcasm in the older Dilgar’s voice. “Now that we have a _restaurant_ , this ship is basically a noble’s yacht… not that I mind.”

“Well, you deserve it.” Nah’dur finished her Bourgas 63 and leaned in her barstool against Fei’nur’s shoulder.

Alexandra arrived, grinning. She slammed the meat platter down in front of Fei’nur. It had some kind of sausage that was curled into a spiral, around three other sausages, each of a different kind, a grilled chicken breast, a pork cutlet, and a massive stick of the characteristic shashlik, with meat and onions and a few other vegetables. Nah’dur’s Kebapche consisted of a mix of sausage-shaped minced meat paste forms and a single patty of the same type. A bowl of garnish for them to share followed.

“I think I’m going to like you, Miss Alexandra.” Avaricious eyes looked to her plate, as she reached for her tableware.

“Thank you, Colonel Fei’nur! _Salut_!” She grinned cheerfully and headed off to another customer.

Kebapche, Nah’dur quickly discovered, was _superb._ “Gods, Fei’nur. Whatever else, this woman _cooks._ ”

Fei’nur gave the young woman she’d helped raise a funny look. “What else would you want from a _chef_?”

“...I don’t know?” Nah’dur rubbed her nose against Fei’nur’s shoulder. “Glad you came with me, my strong?”

Fei’nur’s response at least sounded positive, around the sausage she was consuming with relish.

With a bright expression on her own face, Nah’dur responded by cheerfully tucking in and enjoying dinner. She also got closer and closer to Fei’nur until she was pressed into the bigger woman, making soft noises from time to time.

“ _Nah’dur._ ” Came from the taller woman, in a warning tone.

“Yess?” Nah’dur looked up, batting her eyes. “I like you, what’s the harm in being close?”

“ _Boundaries before the crew, Surgeon-Commander.”_

Nah’dur sighed and pulled back. “Another Bourgas, Miss Alexandra…” Her Omnitool chirped insistently, at the same time Fei’nur’s did.

“Oh, bother.” Nah’dur glanced up. “Well, at least we finished our plates. Sorry, Miss Alexandra! So much for that!” It was a message from the Captain, and she wanted them both at an emergency staff meeting in ten minutes.

“I shall return to this place again.” Fei’nur was already up and moving, speaking into her omnitool, alerting her duty officers to get the Marines shaken out for possible action.

Nah’dur remained in place for a minute longer, watching Fei’nur’s muscles through her uniform. Only when she had swished past the doors did the Surgeon-Commander follow her out.

 

**Undiscovered Frontier _Origins_ : Case Armageddon**

**Season 1, Episode 3**

Act One

 

Another day, another staff meeting. This time, of course, it was on an emergency basis, and people were paying attention as they came in, for it might mean they would shortly be in action. The crew of the _Heermann_ was not present, being on forward reconnaissance, nor was Lar’shan, prepping to launch in the CAP rotation. Everyone else arrived as instructed.

“Good morning, everyone. Time is short, so I shall keep this brief. Commander Imra has reported this universe’s Earth appears to be in the midst of a catastrophic civil war. Long-range sensors indicate the planet has undergone mass driver or kinetic bolide bombardment, and there are multiple fleet units engaged throughout the inner system. She is keeping close watch on the situation, but we are moving in ourselves. The situation, from a standpoint of sentient well-being, appears catastrophic.”

Elia stepped up to Zhen’var’s side, bringing up the briefing documents on the solar system, and then focusing on Earth. She did not apologise for the roughness, they all knew that there had been very little time to prepare these. “Earth-space in this universe is defined by a series of large anomalies at the Lagrange points, in some cases in two discrete clusters.” A close-up flashed onto the screen.

“Prototypical open-type O’Neill Cylinders in coupled pairs to prevent progression.” The image flashed in closer. Elia’s facial expression was wooden and grim.  “As you can see, this colony in particular is massively rent by energy weapons fire. By definition that means we are looking at twenty million people who are either dead or homeless. There are large debris fields at the majority of the Lagrange points. _Heermann_ ’s latest sensor data suggest debris consistent with about only half of the colonies this Earth built still being intact. Based on the number.. A conservative estimate is five billion fatalities. Earth itself we do not have solid data for, but is showing coherent symptoms of nuclear winter.” She flashed into the next part of the deck. “Major weapons signatures … Most vessels are in the two hundred and fifty meter class, so destroyer sized, but we are reading fleets of hundreds.”

“I have already forwarded the initial report and a request for support to higher command, but we can expect to be on our own resources for some time. We _will_ be in action, and I want all hands to know this, and what is at stake.” Zhen’var looked just as severe.

Daria nodded crisply. “Captain, Commander, understood. Do we have any information on their weapons or manoeuvring?”

“None yet, Lieutenant,” Elia answered. “Hopefully Commander Imra will find that out, but not the hard way.”

Anna laughed softly. She had seen enough, grown up hard enough, to know a little levity was important in the moment. “We often have, in the Alliance Navy. Captain, do we prioritize operational conditions for life-saving and humanitarian aid or direct combat? It seems like, for all the damage we have detected, the nations of this world are still in main combat.”

“Direct combat. We will not have the ability to provide aid and save lives until the shooting is over. We cannot fight _that_ many ships to a standstill on our own.”

“Then we should maintain full ZEBRA from the moment we arrive in close Earth space. Commander Saumarez, if you can send me any sensor information at all we may be able to do an engineering analysis and route it to tactical in time to be useful.”

“Of course, Commander. Fera’Xero, if you could work with Engineering on that?”

“Certainly, El’sau.” The Quarian seemed bemused by something, and Elia grinned at being called by her Dilgar name by a non-Dilgar.

“Captain?” Arterus asked. “What _is_ the protocol for responding to this kind of utterly destructive war in a pre-interstellar civilisation? Do we have any general orders to guide our operational objectives?”

“We do. We are to end the mass killing, with whatever means we have to hand. Massive military casualties are one thing, non-combatants dying as this is quite another. Expect that we _will_ be in heavy action in the near future.”

“Well, _Huáscareños,_ ” Will said, rising to his feet. “Let’s show ‘em how it’s done. If you’re off duty, rest until you’re called to quarters. Otherwise… Comrades, please take your stations.”

 

 

 

 

Abebech had not required much analysis for the situation around the asteroid base before giving the order to move in more closely. Once they did the _Heermann,_ sitting quietly under cloak, was the perfect platform for high-fidelity observation.

What she and her command staff saw was a truly incredible battle. Fleets of spaceships in formation moved to engage each other with massive rows of turreted and fixed beam weapons, in wild configurations that seemed unconstrained by the typical notions of gravity or physics, while around them small objects swirled and tangled with each other.

It was not hyperbole to say they were unconstrained by gravity and physics, either: Goodenough could see that there were particle traces throughout local space which were wildly exotic. He was recording everything, and sometimes tapped his own head in frustration. Being the closest thing to a science officer the _Heermann_ had constantly reminded him that he was a Royal Navy Petty Officer in the first half of his life, had never seen the inside of a University, and had known more about tying knots than physics when he first encountered a Darglan brainwave infuser.

Still, it wasn’t like he _quit._ Anything. So next he resolved images of the small craft. Even Abebech made a small noise that sounded almost like a grunt, though it was gone as soon as it came.

“I hate to be the fool,” Goodenough hesitated, “especially since I’m the science officer. But the configuration of those ships makes no sense. Like giant flying men in space?”

“They’re using some kind of particle steering field directed from the arms and legs for precision manoeuvring,” Abebech replied. “The reason for the configuration is to make the steering completely intuitive, even to untrained pilots. They might operate on direct neural interface.”

“Don’t you have one of those?”

“It won’t interface with Darglan technology, but it’s rather mandatory if you want to get anything done in the Solarian territories, so yes,” she answered calmly, watching the flashes of lit and flitting vectoring suits. “Look at that one group, Commander. They cannot get the better of each other, the two suits, the one with the green gunboat on its side, but that fighter is moving to intervene. Do we know what side that is yet? Mehmet?”

“Tactical channels are picking up an Earth Federation fleet reference, Captain.” The lithe Turkish man glared at the screen for a moment. “Their encryption is perfectly advanced, however.”

“Of course it is,” Abebech answered drolly, but her voice faded as she did. Sunglassed eyes gazed out more, and more intently to the viewscreen. “There’s something…”

The _Heermann,_ floating under cloak, was invisible to the combatants, but Abebech’s vantage point that it provided seemed to entrance her. Goodenough had been going to speak, but he held his tongue. He’d never seen his Captain this way before.

She watched the fighter come in again, and again. Both times it was attacked by close-range cutting beams on one of the variable-geometry units. The two units, mechs, for want of a better term, continued to duel, but the duel seemed fitful, distracted.

Abebech was nonetheless fixated on that, and nothing else in the battlefield at all. Around her, the alarms continued to indicate the Code Red status on the _Heermann._ As distracted as she was, Abebech would never permit her ship to be so close to an active warzone except on General Quarters.

Goodenough couldn’t help but observe that the strange duel between the unusual craft seemed as distracted as his Captain. That is, until it came to a sudden and violent denouement. In a flash, the curved but compact green gunboat swept in between the two mechs in what was a recklessly dangerous manoeuvre. When it did, fire lashed out, and caught in the crossfire, it was speared and gutted like a fish on a line.

Abebech bolted upright in her command chair and slapped the comm switch on the armrest. “Goodenough! Coordinates of that gunboat to TR One! Transporter Room One, _lock to coordinates and_ beam _up_!”

Goodenough’s professionalism was such that he confirmed the coordinates and sent them immediately. Abebech’s disciplined crew had been infused with her expectations of speed and efficiency from top to bottom. The transporter chief activated on the coordinates immediately.

A young Indic woman in a shattered spacesuit appeared in the transporter room as the effect faded. Taking no risks with the shattered spacesuit helmet and serious injuries, the Transporter Chief activated the controls again and promptly sent her back on to sickbay in an internal transport. “Doctor Foru, human female, violent decompression and energy weapons injuries!”

Abebech heard that over the intercom, and nodded tightly. “Stand by…”

“Captain,” Goodenough’s crisp voice cut the tension on the bridge. “The mechs of _both_ forces are turning toward us… And so are the ships. _They have found our position_.”

A chill cracked the feeling of tension on the bridge. Abebech said nothing. She offered no explanation for her split-second second to save the life of a total stranger. She just pushed down on the relay for the 1MC. “All Hands, this is the Captain speaking. We have been discovered and may be in action momentarily. Mind your stations.” Then she disengaged the channel, and pitched her voice.  “ _TACTICAL,_ transfer power to shields!”

Goodenough couldn’t help a grin. He approved of the sentiment. Better to have them fighting fit and facing the enemy openly than to come under fire with shields down while hiding under cloak if they could be accurately targeted. “Their power curves are marginal and their accelerations in the tens of g’s, Captain.”

“Very good, Mister Goodenough.” The _Heermann_ rippled into view, shields surging to power. “Bring us about, full impulse power, least-time course to outer Earth orbit.”

“Aye-aye, Captain,” the stiff-backed Ca’elia spun them on heel, the engines ticking up to power, drive-trails glowing as the magnetic vanes steered her wake, her running lights showing as she flicked over on her port beam and showed the primitive human ships her tail with a surge of acceleration. The boxy little power-pack of a ship was, to them, as fast as a whippet, and Ca’elia put it all on display in getting clear.

The call had been the right one. The two groups of ships didn’t engage, and were rapidly left in their wake. “Patch me through to the _Huáscar,_ I need to make another report.” The situation was more complicated than her crew realised.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Narus Foru was the only medical officer on the _Heermann._ As the ship’s Doctor, he found himself reporting to a much junior--but admittedly brilliant--woman in Surgeon-Commander Nah’dur on the _Huáscar,_ who had command of the medical detachment for the much smaller attacker while it was detailed in the big exploration cruiser.

As an Alakin, he was also an alien to the woman on his examining table, and he had no idea what languages she spoke, though he did know her name. Handing her identcard off to one of his nurses, he annotated the log from the English inscription in it alongside the more ornate one in a language he was unfamiliar with. _Lalah Sune._

Nurse Hilfer turned back to him. Dr. Foru wanted a human female present for when his patient woke up, but her expression was one of great surprise. “Doctor, that’s Lojban on the identicard.”

“Lojban?”

“An artificial language humans in some timelines created for interethnic communication. I learned it when I studied linguistics before entering nursing. I don’t really understand what the name means, but… Ensign Lalah Sune, Principality of Zeon Space Attack Force.”

“Zeon is the name of Zeon Zum Deikun, the great philosopher and creator of the Contolist school,” a voice came from the medbed, the Indian English accent strong, though unsurprisingly as it matched both her ethnicity and bindi.

Dr. Foru turned as the woman stirred, looking exhausted, broken down, a wreck at such a young age. But as she turned to face him, she gasped in surprise.

An alien, blue skinned, yellow plumage, an Alakin was anything but human, a proud member of an avianoid species instead. Dr. Foru knew these humans had likely never before seen aliens, and he tried to disarm with politeness. “You are quite cultured to know those details, then.”

“I wanted to understand Char,” Lalah answered, “and it’s all recent history, I…” There was a flash over her mind. “You’re familiar with humans, you live among them, don’t you?”

“...Yes, Ensign. Are you a telepath?”

“I don’t even know what that means,” Lalah answered. “Wait, no… Yes, I think you might be right. I am a Newtype, Doctor Foru. And you have changed everything by saving me. Gods, you have changed everything…”

“Ensign, I don’t know what we have done, but that we saved your life from your ship.”

She looked distantly into the wall, her mind very much on a scene elsewhere. “Yes, you have, but I expected to die. And now they both know, and they’ll both be coming here. For _Me._ Oh Char…” She closed her eyes and started quietly crying.

“Ensign? Who is Char?” But Doctor Foru received no reply, instead, he received his own question.

“Who was the Dark One who saved me, Doctor? Why did she do it?”

“The Dark One? I don’t understand…”

 

 

 

 

Standing well-off the Moon and the strange collection of untouched habitats which sat beyond it and were still undergoing analysis by Fera’xero, the _Huáscar_ received the _Heermann_ behind her protective CAP bubble. Immediately after falling into formation, Abebech hailed the _Huáscar._ “Captain Zhen’var, this is Commander Imra. I am requesting permission to come aboard and brief you in person while the _Heermann_ retains an undocked alert posture.”

Zhen’var’s face flickered in a momentary frown. It _had_ to be serious for her to request that. “Of course, Commander, permission granted.”

“A few minutes, then, Captain. Thank you. Goodenough, you have the conn,” she could be heard saying as she rose and deactivated the comm.

Exactly as promised, she arrived to the transporter right off the _Huáscar’s_ bridge, and as a listed member of the crew did not ask permission to come aboard. Instead she came to attention. “Captain Zhen’var, Commander Imra reporting.”

“To my ready room, Commander.” Zhen’var was clearly tense, as she gestured with a hand and led the way to her small office off the bridge.

Abebech followed immediately, and remained at attention as the Captain sat. Gloved hands folded behind her back, and her eyes impossible to see -- so professional, but she might have as well been called to the carpet.

“Stand easy, Commander. Please, begin briefing me. The situation, as far as I can discern, is both serious and time-critical. I have already requested reinforcements, and am awaiting a response.”

Abebech seemed to try and force herself to relax. “If I may sit, that would be better for what you intend, Captain. The BLUF is that there are telepaths on both sides of this conflict.” She let that sink in for a minute. “The long form is--they’re powerful, untrained ones, lacking in social schema through which to express their powers. And…” She squeezed her gloved hands as if she did not really _want_ to say it. “They are using psionically interfaced technology.”

“Is this… a _great_ concern?” Captain Zhen’var’s expression carried a hint of confusion as she gestured to a chair.

Abebech moved to sit. She thought for a moment how to phrase it best. “Captain, my first training is as a historian, and I am very interested in the history of my people. Let me say that the only time such technology has ever existed in the Multiverse, with a few terrifying exceptions, was during the late Earthreign.”

“Mine, I fear, is not. You will need to explain more, Commander. This technology is the only outlier in this particular universe, please?” She was placing a stylus to pad on her desk to take quick notes.

“Well, they are also using a very abnormal kind of fusion,” Abebech answered after a moment. “But… You must understand that the Earthreign is a riddle in an enigma, boxed in several legends. It was thousands of years ago, and what most people know about it is that it was ‘terrible’ and that it was a totalitarianism of psions. Among biased sorts, the former is implied by the latter, and the latter is a supposition based on the former.”

“I do not see a mental link controlling technology as a situation that would call for such a belief or response, but…” She tapped the stylus down. “You see parallels, Abebech? That is not what concerns _me_.”

“It creates a pathway to kinds of technology that the Multiverse does not currently know. Among the Vulcans there was one similar device, it was called the Stone of Gol, I know that much from my studies of the Multiverse.” she paused, and her lips twisted into a grimace for a moment, and she dropped the train of conversation.

 “Well, Captain,” Abebech continued, “I understand if you don’t consider this important enough. However, please be mindful that in this complicated political situation, these young, newly manifested telepaths are already part of the front-line war effort. I rescued one from her fatally damaged combat craft. She is aboard the _Heermann_ receiving treatment right now. Ensign Lalah Sune, of the Principality of Zeon Space Attack Force.”

“I will wish to speak with her, but we _must_ end the massive bloodshed…” She looked to her subordinate. “Abebech, what is your _intent_?” Her mind was open, as Zhen’var asked her attacker commander - she did not understand _why_ it was important, but she accepted Abebech did… and so she asked in a roundabout way what the elder woman recommended she do.

“My intent is to allow us to end the bloodshed by finding the real cause for the bloodshed and eliminating it. _Lalah Sune,_ Captain, is _important_ in this. But I don’t know how. I just saw the battlefield, I could hear her death-cry, I felt something slip away, and I acted. It was not outside of regulations as Commander of the _Heermann_ to save the life of one stricken in the void, even a combatant in the midst of battle between two enemies.”

“I am not second-guessing it. You have good instincts, Commander. You should warn your crew, however. I will likely be compelled to invoke Case Armageddon after speaking with this woman you have rescued.”

“I will make the appropriate preparations, Captain, for sustained heavy combat. They appear primitive, but both sides do use unusually sophisticated systems in certain areas. If they do not comply, the operation under Case Armageddon will be difficult. These people built hundreds of habs in the space of.... A hundred and ten years, captain. It is a particularly precocious instantiation of humanity.”

“I am aware, we will be hard pressed and likely take heavy damage, but… well. Harm’s Way is the Valiant Way, is it not? I will not see more habs destroyed if I can stop it.”

“Understood.” She rose. “By your leave, then? I will have Ensign Sune transferred aboard as soon as the Doctors clear her, and it shouldn’t be long.”

“Of course. You have clearance to use a priority override if there is anything you believe I need to know that can not wait for channels, no matter the hour or situation. Please brief Commander Saumarez as well. If there is a telepath issue, I wish all of ours to know if you are away from _Huascar_.”

“Very well. I will do that first, Captain.” She stepped out.

_Just what have you given me to deal with, Abebech…?_

 

 

 

 

It didn’t take long to get Lalah Sun transferred to the _Huáscar,_ since she was well enough for transport. The moment she arrived, her eyes widened at once again _another_ species of alien, in this case Surgeon-Commander Nah’dur. “Ensign Sune, is it?”

“Yes, I…” She fell silent. “Your teleporters. I wasn’t awake the last time.”

“They’re very efficient,” Nah’dur answered. “You’re probably curious about my species. I’m a pseudofelinoid, called a Dilgar. In a special arrangement with the Alliance, we provide half the crew of this cruiser. Come over here, please.” She personally helped the woman onto the bed which went into the main multidimensional imager.  “I want to do detailed scans to make sure you are healthy.”

“...Just like at the Flanagan institute… What’s your name, Doctor?”

“ _Surgeon-Commander_ Nah’dur,” she corrected, though gently. “Now just lay still, this will only take a few minutes.”

Lalah closed her eyes and folded her hands, trying to relax as the bed fed her into the machine.

Nah’dur took advantage of the scanning machine to activate her omnitool. “Captain Zhen’var, this is Surgeon-Commander Nah’dur. I have this Ensign Lalah Sune in the scanner, but you can speak to her as you requested the moment that she’s finished, so you could start down now if you like.”

“Thank you, Commander. I shall be down in a few minutes.” crackled from the comms unit in response.

It was as she said, a few moments later Captain Zhen’var arrived in sickbay, stepping straight for Nah’dur. “Surgeon-Commander. The scanning cycle is almost finished?”

“Yes, she’s coming out now, Captain.”

“I will wait in the main ward for her to be ready, thank you, Commander. This may take a while.” She stepped back, then, to wait.

One of the nurses wheeled Lalah Sune in a few minutes later. “Captain.” She rolled the wheel-chair up to the bed, and the alert woman’s eyes snapped to Zhen’var.

“You’re the commander of this vessel,” she asked as she was transferred. Or, not really asked. It was more of a statement of fact. “What is your good name, Ma’am?”

“I am indeed. My name is Zhen’var. You are Ensign Lalah Sune, I am given to understand, the Principality of Zeon Space Attack Force. You are not a prisoner, I shall also clarify at this time. I am considering you a rescued spacefarer at present.”

“Thank you, Captain. That is charitable.” She reached up to carefully rub her eyes, taking note of the woman’s English being much the same as her own.

“I would hear your version of the events and personalities that have led to the present intolerable situation my ships find themselves within, Ensign. Surgeon-Commander, if she is able, some chai for us both. The meeting room attached to your office has a replicator with better seating, yes?”

“Yes, and she can move. She’s recovering very well for someone who was… Exposed to vacuum,” Nah’dur offered from where she was standing behind Zhen’var.

“Thank you, Surgeon-Commander.” Zhen’var reached out a hand. “If you need the help, Ensign. Let us sit someplace more comfortable and speak.”

Lalah took her hand, with a tight nod, and rose with help, her eyes flashing as she did. “Kya aapane maingalor mein english seekh lee?”

“Yes, lekin yah ek jatil tale hai,” Zhen’var replied.

“It’s all right,” Lalah laughed, and pain flashed through her eyes as she moved to sit. “Main ek mumbai girl.”

“I was born in Gvangjsih - Guangxi. I was raised by my mother from when I was a baby in her home, Mangalore. As you may discern, it became even more complicated after _that_.”

“You have walked a strange road, Captain.” She smiled a little, and smiled more when the chai came, sniffing over the big mug first. “Mmn. It has been almost a year.”

“I suspect you have as well. If there is any food you would like, the replicators do spoil us a fair bit. Computer, neer dosa, kori gassi and mutton sukka with mango lassi.” Zhen’var smiled, standing up for the plate which she’d set on the low table between the two couches, along with the glass. “When you are comfortable, as I said. I would know your side of the situation. There is clearly another, but I shall hear yours, for you are here.”

Wide eyes tracked with the food. “I worry about eating too much, when I was almost dead, but, Captain, _Haleem,_ ” she requested, “and salted lassi.” She sipped her chai with her eyes on the replicator. “That could end hunger, but it must take so much energy yes?”

“Correct, though there are technologies, worlds that have reduced scarcity a great deal with such things. On a vessel, the use of energy is less a negative than the use of _volume_ we would require for sufficient supplies on long-duration missions.”

“Volume is a brootal limitation, ke baavajood Minovsky physics,” she answered quietly, looking at her own food after Zhen’var presented it. She tried it, and smiled brightly. “It is very authentic, the system does well. Sab kuch k liye thank you, Captain.”

“I insisted on letting the crew tinker with the formulations until they were satisfied, myself included. Minovsky physics… the odd readings our sensors have been detecting from your vessels are related, I assume?”

“Recycling a pure Helium-3 chain reaction through a special design of multi-stage reactor produces a previously unpredicted particle named after the discoverer, Captain, it is what much technology on both sides is based upon.” It was hardly a detailed technical explanation, but it conveyed the gist. She switched more to English as the conversation got more technical.

“Hm. Interesting.” She did hide her interest, a previously unpredicted particle? Fera’xero would love the news, she was sure.

“Earth began to spread into the stars bahut samay pahale, Captain. Once there were four hundred and fifty-five bunches--couples of colonies--in orbit. Kya aap yahee jaanana chaahate the?”

“I would wish to know _everything_ , but, yes. Just how did such a terrible war start, Ensign? It appears to be one to the knife, with all restraint abandoned in the pursuit of victory.”

“I only know what Char told me, Captain.” Her expression tightened into one of bitterness, flushed with shame. “Jab Zeon aaya tha, government officials kahana Earth chaklay lagna.”

“A civil war, then, or a war for independence, one that has grown extremely sharp indeed.”

“Captain, main ek Earth Federation Citizen tha, Earth was very troubled, no raw materials. But all manufacturing was there. Zeon diya gaya tha ajaadi many years ago. But there was a blockade, ajaadi kee keemat. They were isolated.”

“Where I came from, it was Mars and the extra-solar colonies who chafed, and eventually rebelled against the government of Earth when it fell into the hands of evil men.

“Mars does not have enough people here,” Lalah replied. “Zeon declared mukti yuddh for the Spacenoids, lekin badale they bombarded Earth with colonies. Government flee to a secret base in the Amazon, there was a truce, Zeon jameen par soldiers bheje gae, they conquered most of Earth.”

“A liberation war, we could have supported, but bombarding cities, civilians with the kinetic bolides that an O’Neil colony represents…” She grit her teeth.

“Captain,” she buried her face, and continued with great deliberation in carefully enunciated English, “The Earth Federation was brutally corrupt. I was sold as a prostitute for the workers building the great new planned cities in the Amazon. It was a man of Zeon who rescued me from this shame. That is why I am loyal to Zeon. Zeon welcomes anyone who wishes to live the life of a spacenoid. Even a Mumbai whore,” she almost spat the words, “can become an officer and gentlewoman in the nation of the Red Comet.”

Zhen’var clenched her teeth hard enough for them to make a gnashing noise as she planted her face in her hands. “ _Mother Shakti._ I cannot support colony drops. _Nor_ can I support abuse or oppression of an entire people. Ensign, you… thank you.”

“It must be told, Captain, you are a woman, you understand not to repeat these things,” She said very, very precisely in English before reverting to the more comfortable Hinglish. “The Zeon government arranged for me to study at a special institute for those with Newtype senses. They trained us to be warriors. And Char, the Red Comet, asked for me by name to fight with him, Captain. He is my love, my beau, voluntarily so. I am loyal to the man who saved me. Kisee aur ke lie war kaise lad sakata hai?”

“Be loyal to yourself as well, Ensign… but I understand that feeling very well.” She indicated herself, when she did.

“You have your own story,” Lalah replied. There was, to someone not used to telepaths, something disconcerting in her certainty. “I know you are not from this universe.”

“You take such information well. It is so, Ensign.”

“I expected to be dead, Captain, with a certainty that makes my life feel impossible.” She had fully switched to English.

“I have been called impossible before.” She replied with a grin, going on; “You must thank the commander of the _Heermann_ , however. Commander Abebech Imra is the one who chose to intervene, though I support her completely in so doing.”

“The dark one…” She murmured. Then her eyes flitted up. “And _not_ for the colour of her skin. Give her my thanks.”

The captain gave her a strange look - people with mental powers had called Imra dark before, and she herself did not understand it at _all_. “I shall.”

Finishing her food, she looked down, and bit her lip. “Earth Federation is on the offensive, Captain. Zeon retreated from Earth. We were fighting to spoil the advance on A Bao a Qu.”

“I understand. My people, the Dilgar…” She trailed off, a roil of emotions. “The war must end. The _killing_ of innocents must end. Those in uniform do not deserve to die in the effort. Now, tell me the _details_ , Ensign… I want, I _need_ to know _everything_ that has happened that you may tell me.”

“It’s better to use English for this.” She folded her hands, and looked intent. “Captain, I do not like killing, but for Char, I do what I must. I was trained at Doctor Flanagan’s institute, it’s in Side Six--at the L4 point, the Riah Republic. They declared independence when the war started, but they haven’t joined it. They’re the only ones untouched, except the outer system.”

“It must be a difficult place for them, to be between two powers seeking every advantage. You departed from there to the Zeon Space Attack Force, then, once your training was complete?”

“We all did. The institute was a front for Zeon, Captain. I was sent there at Char’s behest. Riah was attacked in fighting over the institute a few months ago, though.”

“I see. Ensign, you will remain aboard. I _cannot_ let this situation continue. If you will give your parole, it will greatly ease your circumstances. I regret to inform you that under my fleet’s standing orders, I believe I must intervene in your peoples’ war.”

“Will you stop the killing, Captain? Can you?” They want it to continue… I think everyone does, I wish I knew who wanted peace.”

  
“I can. I _will_. I will accept your help, if you will give it, Ensign Sune.” Her determination was visible, as was her _confidence_ , even the possibility of facing such long odds.


	2. Act 2

**Act Two**

 

 

Within another hour, Zhen’var’s request for urgent communication with headquarters had borne fruit. “Admiral Maran is on priority one, Captain,” CPO Bor’eri came over the intercom in her quarters.

“Patch him through to my terminal immediately, Chief.” Zhen’var moved to sit, adjusting her uniform as she did, swinging her chair to face the holo-pickup directly.

“Captain Zhen’var. As usual, my apologies for the delay.” Admiral Maran slowly seemed healthier the further away from the Reich’s surrender they got. The war must have posed unimaginable stress to him. “We received your message and the preliminary assessment as well. Clearly the situation is catastrophic for this Earth.”

“I agree, sir. They appear to have successfully gone onto the counter-offensive, but both sides still have a great deal of strength remaining, with atrocities aplenty on all sides. The Principality of Zeon appears to have begun the war and made repeated bolide attacks with large O’Neil type colonies. Our best analysis is that Earth’s greater resources have begun to tell, with various mis-steps on the side of the Principality denying them victory. One may say it is not dis-similar to the Second World War’s Eastern Front after the Battle of Stalingrad in general situation and mutual hatred.”’

“The assessments suggest billions are dead, Captain. Can we assess responsibility? Objectives? Ideology? I understand that you have a Zeon pilot aboard the _Huáscar_ at the moment.”

“She was… _treated in an ill-fashion_ by the Earth government. A Zeon pilot rescued her. She herself proved to have an aptitude for piloting, and serves them to repay his kindness with extreme personal devotion.” She paused, to gather her words. “It is an independence revolt with… overtones of fascist thought on the side of the rebels. They appear to have been the one to drop the colony in a failed decapitation strike. Rules of war were only mutually agreed after the first month, in which I estimate more than a billion died, sir.”

“Make sure no more civilian mass death occurs, Captain. You are authorised to negotiate any peace between the warring factions which does not tie _our_ hands in seeking out prosecutions for crimes against humanity in the future.”

Her spine visibly stiffened, and Zhen’var’s voice came out crisp and clipped; “Understood, Admiral. Reinforcements may still be urgently needed if they insist on pressing the point.”

“Three cruisers can arrive within fifteen hours, Captain, with a squadron of attackers and a destroyer.”

“If it goes as it may, sir, I will need them. If I fight another fleet alone, I _may_ have a chance. Wish me good fortune, sir, for I shall need to be moving in. _Heermann_ and I have been noticed already.”

“May you always find courage in your stand against the Darkness, Captain,” he answered, almost like a benediction. “Take such actions as you deem necessary. You are authorised any exigency necessary to protect civilian life.”

“Thank you, Admiral.” As soon as the connection blinked off, she reached for her comms panel; “Officer of the Watch, full ship’s command meeting in fifteen minutes.”

  
  
  
  


Everyone arrived, including Héen and Dugan, for a full command meeting. Seconds of departments had the bridge. Some had been drawn from sleep, and were still waking up from it, Chief Dugan among them, who was holding an utterly massive styrofoam cup which said Dunkin’ Donuts on it.

“Seriously, Chief?” Elia, who was preparing another briefing deck, stared for a moment.

“It’s only five credits a month to sign up for their replicator program, you better believe it, Ma’am.”

“Does it actually make a difference in how the coffee tastes?” Nah’dur leaned in.

“Oh yeah, Surgeon Commander.” He grinned.

“Hmm. Perhaps I shall like this kind of coffee.”

Elia was looking back down at her interface, and glanced up again, giving a helpless _you know what_ expression to Zhen’var.

Will saw it and stepped over, speaking _sotto-voiced._ “Is the holoprojector seriously broken again?”

“Please do not make me replicate a plotting board and some grease pencils.” Zhen’var’s tone was _resigned_. “Shadow puppets would be more reliable.”

The little knot of the ship’s senior officers couldn’t be ignored. “Ma’am, is the holoprojector broken again?” Dugan asked from down at the far end of the table. “I’ve put in five ServiceTrak requests with the Computer Engineering Detachment about that thing since we first deployed.”

“Anna, you are not getting out of at least some blame in this.” At least the Captain had a smile… that was more of a pained grimace, granted.

There was some kind of muffled Polish curse under her breath as she got up and walked around to the front of the table, holding her coffee. “Elia, do you have that little screwdriver you use to get at buttons you can’t depress with your gloves?” As she spoke, Fera’xero also got up to help.

“Yes,” Elia answered, reaching up to her collar and pulling it out of the breast-pocket with a flourish before handing it to the Chief Engineer. With Elia, Anna, Zhen’var and Will all clustered around the holoprojector at the head of the table, Fera’xero’s effort to help ended up leading to him simply standing there awkwardly next to the Captain’s shoulder, not sure of what to say or do and whether or not to retreat to his chair.

Zhen’var groaned. “The best and brightest from _multiple_ universes... and we are being defeated by a holoprojector. This was _never_ in the broadcasts about glorious naval battles. Still, it could be worse, at least we can be _reasonably_ sure it is a design defect. Anna, you have my permission to make an OrdAlt. You can even take some ship’s reimbursables to make the entire room a holodeck at this point, _that_ would work better than this flimsyweight.”

“One second please, Captain...” With a straining look of intense concentration, her face was smushed like a pastry up against the open casing of the holoprojector, three fingers managing to hold the screwdriver to something. Then with almost a growl, she shoved it about another half inch in, and the holoprojector activated. Extricating herself and closing the case, she shook her head wryly to Elia. “You can take it out when we’re done with the briefing.”

Elia buried her head in her gloved hands, chuckling. “No problem, Anna.”

It seemed almost like in the background one could hear Violeta saying to Arterus _‘you can’t make this shit up’,_ but it was quiet enough that it was hard for Will to tell. He shot a glance to Zhen’var.

She waved with her free hand, face buried in her hand, a look of pain on her face as she either softly laughed or cried, it was hard to tell. “Everyone sit down, _please_. The situation is as _serious_ as our equipment is farcical on occasion.”

Elia waited politely for the others to get back to their seats after half flopping back into her own before composing herself. That female member of Psi-Corps instinct to never let yourself be seen as anything other than a perfectly kitted out doll in public was very strong in her. “With your permission, Captain? I know you have some topics of your own, but as you directed, I have the summary of all our intelligence-gathering to date on the situation ready to go.”

“Go ahead. You even have my report from the conversation, so all I have to add are our orders at the end.”

“Understood, Captain.” Elia remained seated. They were all comrades here, there was no need for formality. She clicked up the first projection. “The ruling family of Zeon. The Zabis. Degwin Sodo Zabi is the father, you can see he has suffered greatly from an early life in microgravity and sustained radiation exposure, but his children are part of the new, fit generations born in artificial gravity. Gihren, the eldest, appears to be the primary leading force of the war, the chief ideologue of the regime. Dozle, known for his temper but a devoted family man who was a practical spaceforce commander. Killed in action at that asteroid base the _Heermann_ observed, several weeks ago. Kycilia, current head of the Secret State Agency _and_ the Mobile Assault Force. Garma, Earth Attack Force commander until his death in action in mysterious circumstances. The Zabi family renamed Side 3 in honour of Degwin Zabi’s longtime friend and mentor, the philosopher Zeon Zum Deikun, whose philosophy of Contolism is critical to understanding everything we know about this war to date. Note that all this information comes from Earth Federation propaganda broadcasts to their own people on the surface, except for a few tangential references from our guest that seem to confirm broad particulars. But, treat the information suspect as you should.”

“The cliff-notes version of Contolism,” Elia grinned down the table, “is that it supposes that the next stage in human evolution will be obtained through evolution of the _mind,_ to perceive others and things without moving--in short, telepathy, telekinesis, and so on. This is held to be a good, natural, spiritual development of humanity. Contolism holds that humanity is destroying its link with the Earth and polluting the sacred mother-world through overpopulation and resource consumption; the only solution is to evolve into a new form whose spiritual centredness is not linked to the Earth. That will happen inevitably and naturally through the migration of the human population to space. Zeon’s propaganda is nothing less than the argument that their objective is in fact to engineer total human migration from, and sapient abandonment of, Earth, as a political realisation of the beliefs of Contolism.”

“In reality,” her voice turned grim, “Zeon conducted Operation British, the first colony drop, with the objective of destroying the headquarters of the Earth Federation, regardless of collateral damage. Earth Federation forces diverted the Colony, but it crashed into Sydney, instead.” The crater was a graphic example of the scale of the destruction, and Elia showed that next and let them dwell on it. “Half the population of Earth has died in the past year, and it’s almost as bad in orbit. The combined total population was about twenty billion, by the way. And Zeon’s propaganda is not matched by behaviour in practice. The Earth Federation claims that they gassed the population of the Colony used in Operation British. Fellow Spacenoids. And they attacked the Riau Republic, neutral Side 6, on dubious grounds. The destruction of colonies has been conducted with wild abandon, though at least some Earth Federation guilt must be entertained, generally the Earth Federation seems to have evidence of major atrocities by Zeon during the Battle of Loum directed against other Spacenoids.”

“Again, this information is primarily from state propaganda sources, and most of them in the Earth Federation.” Elia paused. “We know, too, that Contolism’s new humans exist here: Telepaths. They are present in the armies of both sides, and the Zeonic forces, too, have fully integrated them--including with technology Commander Imra detected which may, in fact, harness telepathic abilities into physical effects and control of machines. This, combined with the Minovsky particle-based physics of the ubiquituous mobile suits makes our opponents more serious than a fleet which at first pass would otherwise be the 2180 Earth Force back home. The militarisation of telepaths is continuing and accelerating, and the Flanagan Institute is now known and was attacked, but probably continues research within Riau. The nature of this research is unknown, except that it produced Ensign Sune’s training and the telepathically controlled weapons pods she operated from her prototype fighter in action.”

“At this time, Zeon has been pushed out of most of the lower Sides and defeated on the surface of the Earth. However, Zeon still possesses several major fleets, and the massive asteroid base ‘A Bao a Qu’ which is strategically located across the lowest-energy routes to the far side of the Moon, the location of Zeon at the translunar lagrange point. The Federation fleet was mobilising to advance on A Bao a Qu when we intervened.” She finished cycling through the images. “That is all, comrades.”

“Our orders are simple. Case Armageddon has been invoked. We are to end the mass civilian deaths with any means necessary, and if possible, create a peace that does… not impair our ability to prosecute for war crimes in the future.” She grimaced at that last part. “Three cruisers, with a squadron of attackers and a destroyer, will be arriving in approximately fifteen hours. For once, we have reinforcements, which means this is as bad as you have all been secretly thinking it might be. My intent is to carry out those orders, no matter how confused or dangerous the situation may be.”

“What you need, get it to us now,” Will added simply. “We’ll make sure you’ve got what you need, but only if we know about it.”

“We are going to be attacked, we are going to be attacking. Beyond that, I cannot predict what the situation will involve. Ensign Sune may be problematic, her loyalties are _personal_ rather than political. Full combat CAP, and Condition Yellow until relieved.”

There was a chorus of acknowledgment, but Elia was looking thoughtful. “Captain, in your report of your conversation with Ensign Sune, she indicated she’s following a man named Char, correct?”

“That is correct. My _suspicion_ is that there is some sort of mental, as well as personal bond.”

“Possibly. But it’s certainly enough for us to identify the man. Char Aznable, the Red Comet. The supreme Zeon Space Attack Force Mobile Suit Ace of the war, unstoppable since it began.” She flashed the data-file out.

“Expect him to seek to free her. Lar’shan, he has gotten quite the kill count on fighters, have your people ready. Tactical, his tally in capital ships is equally impressive, if he can get past our shields somehow, it will go wrong _very quickly_ for us.”

“We don’t yet know enough about their technology to speculate on that, either,” Anna said. “We have to assume they can hurt us.”

“I can begin an analysis of the Minovsky effect, Captain,” Fera’xero had already been making notes on his omnitool.

“And I’ll get a revised manning plan out to maximise crew rest in the short term without compromising Condition Yellow on the expedition of imminent sustained combat, Ma’am,” Dugan said from the end of the table.

Lar’shan and Stasia looked at each other. They had enough to go on. “Yellow CAP will be going up in fifteen minutes, Captain.”

“The usual, we may need the deck on short notice. I wish I had more information for you all, but I do not. Rush the crew through a last good meal and time to put personal effects in order, then get them to stations. We are into it now, _Huáscareños_.”

Elia leapt to her feet, and for lack of any formal salute to make or sword to draw, raised her gloved fist into the air. “¡ _Viva Huáscar y viva Huáscareños_!”

 

 

 

The _Zanzibar_ strummed under his feet. Inside of one of the spinning gravity chambers of the cruiser, a Newtype felt nothing even when some of the other crew might be queasy from the small radius and high velocity of the section, but instead of that typical feeling, the chamber was locked down, as the _Zanzibar_ was in a continuous 3g burn which was driving the crew down toward the deckplates--all except Char Aznable, who stood tall.

The weight was painful, but part of the natural burden and experience of life as a Spacenoid. Unlike the gravity of bitter old Earth, it would fade, it was as transitory as the fuel for the reactor, gone in a moment to give light to the dreams of humans in stars. Char was not one to hold his desperate exile as a child with much sentimentality, but some of the story had crept into his bones and refused to leave.

In the Andalusian idle of their ancient fortress, the family de Mas had raised him—except they were called Mass, because of Prime Minister Marcenas’ spelling reforms during his effort to wipe out nationhood on Earth. Catalan in national origin, but staunch old National Spaniards loyal to the Bourbon King, the strange friendship of this father and that man, who clung to the old stories of the past, of knights and El Cid, had sustained him when otherwise he would have been a desperate orphan with his sister. The hot Andalusian nights, the strumming guitar and the tune _El Blocao de la Muerte,_ the bitter complaints over the erasure of El Caudillo’s memory, these had left an indelible impression on his heart.

For someone raised to believe in the necessary migration of all of humanity from Earth, the taste of dust lingered with him, and actually reinvigorated his beliefs. _As long as dust is still on our boots, it will tug at our heartstrings and have us return to the old tombs for honour’s sake, again and again. I spent just enough time in it to know why they love it too much to give it up of their own free will._ In this moment, the noise of the _Zanzibar_ ’s engines, running at 140% power, sounded like the guitar, and the guitar melted into the Sitar… And he thought of Lalah.

For an aching, heart-breaking moment of certain rage, Char had watched her die. He had felt it start, he had seen it, it had ripped his heart. And then he had felt the life of air and a surge of hope fill her, a strange, disorienting displacement. As he had swept past his rival, his eyes had snapped, his sensors had tracked, and he had seen the strange and compact ship which had shimmered into reality.

In a heartbeat all of his terror and rage had snapped into a clarity of purpose. He had to rescue Lalah, _at all costs._ And so he had broken off from his original mission and summoned the _Zanzibar._ It was hardly a rogue mission. The moment Space Attack Force command had seen the data on the incredible performance of the mystery ship, his diversion had been authorised.

Initially, he had pursued only on the basis of his feeling of Lalah’s location. This had taken them far beyond the battlefield, burning through fuel reserves toward the area of Lunar orbit, but far from Luna and Zeon at the moment. The pursuit was relentless, and his officers were beginning to nervously check the fuel reserves.

“Sir! Long range scan is now picking up an anomaly--some indications of separation.”

“An anomaly with separation? More than one ship?” He turned toward the plotting board. “That would only be expected. I doubt a vessel half the size of the _Zanzibar_ would be…” He trailed off. _Interuniversal._ The Zabi family did not need to know that. Let them think it was aliens and fear. But he knew. He knew. “Interstellar. Plot the necessary parabolic to intercept the fixed position.”

“We are exactly on course already, Sir!”

“Then hold course… And begin preparing our Mobile Suit complement.”

“Sieg Zeon!”

Char watched the dots slowly resolve on the plot. He _knew,_ he _knew,_ that Lalah Sune was aboard, and as long as he had a _chance_ to rescue her, nothing else would, could, matter.

 

 

 

Amuro Ray stood on the bridge of the White Base, feeling like he was wilting into the deck from the continuous burn, and envious of the wounded Sayla’s composure. Captain Noa dragged himself through one step at a time, pacing in front of them in front of the plotting board, his head weighed by both gravity and plots.

They had told him everything. _Everything._ They’d had to. The fact that the mysterious ship had rescued a Zeon pilot through teleportation had been what had won Bright Noa over. It had been what he used, with less emphasis on the teleportation and more on the incredible acceleration and performance of the ship, to receive permission to break off from the advance on A Bao a Qu and pursue them.

If Zeon had more than one ship like that, they might well yet win the war. Not simply turn the Federation back from A Bao a Qu-- _win the war._ “You’re sure she was still alive? That you could both feel her with your… Newtype abilities?”

“Yes,” Sayla said emphatically from where she stood. “It’s hard to understand, I didn’t know why I was feeling that, and I didn’t think, until the contact with that ship, that I could sense like _that,_ Captain, but I could and I did. And so did Amuro. The pilot of that special Zeon Mobile Suit was in her cockpit one moment, and on the mystery ship the next.”

“And there’s something which is strengthening what you can do?”

“Or focusing it,” Sayla answered, a bit distracted.

“Amuro?” Bright asked a bit sharply, pressing him out of his reverie.

“Yes, of course she’s right, Captain! I can still feel _her_ out there, we’re heading the right way.”

“Feel the Zeon pilot…” Bright muttered, looking back to the plot. He didn’t like the sound of it, even though he respected what Amuro and Sayla were going through and that nobody could control this, that if it was natural it was hardly their fault. He knew the crew of the White Base was too tightly knit, but already, back on Earth and in the Sides, a paranoia about Newtypes had begun to grow.

“It wasn’t like anything I can describe. But we’ve absolutely got to get to the bottom of …”

“I know, I know, Ensign.”

“Captain,” the crisp young woman at Navigation interrupted. “We are detecting an anomaly… Two, repeat two anomalies.”

“Ensign Yashima? _Anomalies_?”

“Orbiting masses. I’m not detecting drive output, but they’re almost certainly ships. We’re having trouble deriving any data from them at this range. No Minovsky particle signatures.”

“Two ships… Does the analysis indicate mass?” Bright was thinking again. This mission had been fine with one small ship, now…

“Indistinct, but the length of one of the returns is increasing as the aspect ratio changes. I think it might be over a kilometre long, Captain. In fact, I’m fairly confident of it.”

“A kilometre long _ship,_ not an asteroid base?” He did some quick mental scaling from the _White Base_ and paled. A kilometre long White Base, courtesy of geometric scaling, would mass 4 _million metric tonnes_ fully laden, compared to the White Base, barely the size of a wet navy aircraft carrier.

“Stand by to report to Mobile Suits and fighters. I want to keep the White Base out of range of these contacts, but there’s no question they must be investigated closely.” _If that is a Zeon ship, they could still win the war in an afternoon!_

 

 

 

 

Will had barely taken over the night shift for the evening, from an exhausted looking Zhen’var. He’d found out pretty quickly what an exhausted Dilgar looked like, in several different flavours. Physically, in the gym, a human instructor who didn’t realise the physiological differences could push a Dilgar to insane feats of exertion--for about five minutes, after which he or she would be a ball of rolling, quivering muscles on the ground, matted with sweat. The only one that _wasn’t_ true of was Fei’nur, who could run for hours like a human. It was pretty clearly her cybernetics.

Culturally, he wasn’t sure what a Dilgar said to a mental hygienist. Standards of care and practice were just too different for them to help humans or vice-versa, except Elia, and that entire thing was _complicated._ Human crewers saw Va’tor anyway, but Will wasn’t sure about that. He could, though, tell without much effort that the intensity of their mission was grinding on Zhen’var. They were at alert. They were alone and responsible for everything. Billions of people might die if they failed, and Lalah Sune’s story, whatever had passed between them, had left her in a very particular state.

One of the things they’d managed to incorporate in the design of the _Huáscar_ was a sea cabin. Federation ships, the inspiration for the _Aurora,_ didn’t have them. But at quarters with the ship buttoned up, the Captain leaving the vicinity of the bridge was almost unfathomable. So the tiny, closet-sized space with a washroom and real bed one door from the bridge was where Zhen’var was sleeping now.

Will was settling in for the equivalent of a long afternoon. Schedules were staggered so that Elia served Shift One, a rotating one of the ops Lieutenants for Shift Two, and Will Shift Three (with the option of assigning an Ops lieutenant if he got too busy--this was happening more and more often), but they were all awake during Shift Two. Now the night-watch was his job, multi-million tonnes of starship wrapped around him like a city and a cocoon all in one, and never sleeping.

“Sir, a contact just went hot in at zero-zero-five mark nine, range seventeen kiloklicks.” The junior Operations officer, an Alakin named Lieutenant Belzac, was glaring at his screen. “I don’t know why we didn’t detect them sooner.”

“Have _Heermann_ and Patrol Two confirm the contact.” _So much for even the smallest break._ He snapped alert in the command chair, reaching for his coffee and drowning a huge swallow. Coffee was a part of human life on a ship for the thirteenth colony, in every incarnation. Anna and Violeta and Chief Dugan from the Captain’s home universe and Chief Héen from her indigenous community--And everyone on the _Koenig_ as well. Heck, even _Abebech,_ which as far as he was concerned was the only proof he had she was mortal _._ And so Will had gotten with the programme pretty darn fast. Only Elia was an exception, and she drank her tea by the pot, in cups blacker than Hades.

“ _Heermann_ confirms, Sir.” A voice came up from PriFly, it was Stasia. “Patrol Two confirms contact, Sir.”

 _Speaking of, how the hell is she awake?_ “Set Condition Red, MC ZEBRA. Put them on screen. Is Patrol Two in a position to intercept?”

He knew Zhen’var would be out of her bed and here in about thirty seconds as the alarms began to howl and they again went from Yellow with modified-ZEBRA set to Red-ZEBRA “Yes Sir. Major Lar’shan is proceeding with intercept now.”

“Reinforce him,” Will ordered. _Directives, let them do their jobs._ He was learning too.

“Launching alert five, Sir.” Stasia killed the commlink.

Ahead of him, the image of a ship resolved itself. It was larger than an Attacker, but was pretty much a destroyer in size. And he swore he had seen them in the images Abebech had recorded during the battle at the asteroid base.

Will looked up to see Zhen’var padding onto the bridge. He rose. “Captain on the Bridge!” Standing orders during Condition Red meant there was no response from the crew, except to note it. “Permission to report to the Secondary Bridge, Captain?” This was what kept him physically fit: He had approximately two minutes to reach secondary control before the ship finished buttoning up.

“Granted, go.” Zhen’var moved to her command position, buckling in reflexively. Her eyes scanned the displays, and the running auto-log. “Incoming contacts may be presumed non-cooperative hostile, but do not fire until fired upon.”

  
  


 

Lar’shan was swinging ahead to protect the runabout. He didn’t like it, but they needed to investigate the contact. His four fighters were the very tip of his cruiser’s defences, but he didn’t know at all the strength of the enemy.

“There’s sensor interference at 4090-X-2, possibly a doppler effect,” Lead Two, ‘Jaunty’, reported tersely. As usual callsigns were chosen by others for maximum effect. Jaunty was very terse.

“Greenthumb, tighten up,” Lar’shan ordered to the second element in the Lead Flight. “Uncharacterised distortion was encountered by the _Heermann_ as well.”

“Roger, Lead One.”

Lar’shan tapped open his comm to Prifly. “PriFly Actual, WC50 Actual. We’ve got interference undergoing a doppler shift around grid point 4090-X-2, triangulate please.”

“We can’t resolve it either, but … _WC50 Actual, Mobile Suits closing rapidly on your position! Six repeat six bogeys!”_

“Evasive!” Lar’shan snapped the controls on his Mongoose hard. The squadron began to separate by elements when the lancing of the beam weapons tore through them. Six mobile suits, each about twenty meters high, descended rapidly from the sun.

Their weapons slashed through shields like they weren’t there, the Minovsky particle effect disrupting the cohesion of the shields. It made weapons which otherwise would not have been able to penetrate any kind of shielding immensely dangerous.

Before Lar’shan could finish a yaw turn to bring his guns to bear, he saw a flash of the beam weapons ripping down the flank of his wingman’s Mongoose. They were coming from the distinctive, single red-painted Mobile Suit, and he acutely remembered in that moment the briefing.

_Char Aznable, the Red Comet._

The stricken fighter raced on, the interior glowing as it vented plasma. “Jaunty, get out, _now_!” He had no time to spare as he sent his fighter screaming back on its original course, flipping the cover off his gun toggle. “This is WC50 Actual we are under attack by six bogeys and totally defensive we have lost Jaunty repeat we have lost Jaunty _I am engaging under ROE._ ” Over to the flight comm. “ _Fire Free_!”

“Lead Flight, SC4-2 is two minutes out at full burn!” Stasia’s voice was welcome, but the battle would be _over_ in two minutes, and Lar’shan barely took the time to reassure himself that Jaunty’s locator beacon was flashing.

One of the Mobile Suits flickered into view for a heartbeat through his violent banking turn. His eye flashed recognition, he had them in the targeting sensor for just a flash of green to red, but it was enough. A gloved finger twitched on the trigger. A burst of pulse phaser fire from the newest mark of Mongoose cannon opened up. Like a modern version of a gatling gun, a series of clustered emitters each briefly emitted energy in sequence to avoid overheating.

The silence of the firing was rewarded by the silence of the flash of light. The Mobile Suit he had targeted exploded, decisively and violently. Even that brief moment he had exposed himself, and without thinking about it more than a heartbeat, Lar’shan threw the throttle forward and accelerated at speeds vastly in excess of what any of the Mobile Suits could manage.

His training and instincts had been exactly right, as the beams of the Red Mobile Suit ripped through the position he would have been in at that moment with his prior velocity. Now it was five to… _Two._ His pulse quickened at the realisation that Kenosha was already down. Lar’shan snapped around so hard the Mongoose creaked around him.

“ _Lead,_ this is Greenthumb, I am _totally defensive_! The Red Suit is tracking me!”

“Hang in there, I’m coming around!” Lar’shan began to complete his turn before, abruptly, he came under attack by three of the other Mobile Suits. Lar’shan made the difficult deflection chip-shot through his manoeuvre which destroyed another of the enemies, and then ripped past them faster than they could counter, tracking and firing at him, but not matching his constant little jerky jinks with the side manoeuvring thrusters.

He skidded out of the turn and threw the throttles back to full. It was just in time to be too late. Greenthumb had turned back onto the Red suit to engage, but at the last second the Red Comet had jinked to the side and activated… _a beam-sabre!?_...which neatly sliced the wing of the Mongoose off. The craft spun in circles, out of control with uneven thrust and mass. A moment later Greenthumb punched out, too, and Lar’shan was alone.

Alone, but not out of the fight. He fired immediately. Again, the Red Suit dodged, but this time, Lar’shan flicked himself out of the way, not to dare let himself come into close range. As he did, his acceleration quickly carried him far away from the four remaining Mobile Suits. The group of two surviving from his tangle with three moments ago were converging on the two, presumably the Red Comet and his wingman.

Lar’shan got a strangely quiet, intense expression, as he activated an open radio comm. “You are very good, but you have led these neophytes into an unfortunate situation,” he said, and then cut his fighter hard over. Using acceleration and velocity he ‘dove’ on the two Mobile Suits at a speed so fast their computers registered his fighter as some kind of frighteningly fast anti-ship missile.

They were quite capable of engaging, and spun about to do so, but then he turned violently to the side and skewed the front of his Mongoose to face them, letting their targeting parameters show the wrong aspect ratio and fire wide. Choosing one, a single, quick burst of fire, again on deflection, blew it up.

“You may be the best fighter pilot I’ve ever seen, but don’t you think that turn of acceleration is cheating?” The voice which came back over the open comm was speaking in cultured, polite English, with no particular accent.

“No more than your beam-sabre, Sir,” Lar’shan replied as he skid-steered the Mongoose by varying the engine throttles and kicked her right back around to climb up from below the remaining Mobile Suit in the first group.

The Red Suit kicked up to three times the acceleration of the others, but it wasn’t enough to bring him back into range in time. Lar’shan got a snap-lock with the laser seeker head option on one of his missiles which overcame the jamming from the drives on the Mobile Suits, and fired. The pilot detected it immediately and spun his suit to engage the missile, but that let Lar’shan buck his nose down as he continued upwards and again dispatch one of the suits in deflection.

Bringing his nose back up as rapidly as he could, he went to full power again to escape the abrupt onslaught of the Red Comet and his wingman. Pulling clear of their fire, he climbed high in the Z-axis relative to the plain the two Mobile Suits were holding, and then scanned through his sensors. The optical tracker and laser pointer on the targeting pod pinged the _Zanzibar_ as he did.

 _That should get their attention._ Lar’shan pointed his nose outward. “Cholita,” he called the flight lead for 4-2. “Grab the coordinates for their mothership off my taclink and go for it. I want ‘em scared.”

“On it, boss.” The four incoming Mongeese stayed at full power, curving toward the cruiser. The Red Comet, this far out, had no hope of rescue if he lost his mothership, and he had no choice but to lead into a full burn to interpose himself as the starfighters made for the cruiser.

As he did, Lar’shan pulled right and briefly made for the cruiser as he did. The Red Comet’s wingman began to track him, but as he did, the angle allowed Lar’shan to identify the Mobile Suits by letting his targeting computer take the difference between the distortion and the spreading drive tails of the fresh flight of Mongeese. The result was a full salvo of his remaining missiles that he dove on in behind.

Both the Mobile Suits violently exploded into evasive manoeuvres and turned to target the missiles, shooting most down. As they did, Lar’shan came in hard and fast, targeting the Red Comet’s wingman and taking him in a classic high-low pass as he was overwhelmed between missiles and the incoming fighter. A violent turn at the end carried him safely away from the Red Comet’s beam sabre.

“Well,” Lar’shan said a bit coldly into the open channel, not sure if all of his pilots had survived punching out, “now we’re even.”

The Red Comet’s suit spun hard to the left, tracking and firing. “Call your friends off, alien,” the voice answered. “I want this to be between just you and me.”

There was only one thing for the son of the Champion-errant of the Dilgar War to do. He agreed. _Of course._ “Challenge met, Red Comet.”

 

 

 

The _Huáscar_ was moving forward … _Carefully._ Once it had been clear that the weapons of the Mobile Suits, though low-powered, were firing directly through energy shields like they weren’t there, Zhen’var had ordered the _Heermann_ to cloak and manoeuvre to an advantageous position and for a half-deck strike to be immediately readied. Though the firepower of the weapons was pitiful by multiversal standards, the lack of effective shielding was ominous.

“Captain, the analysis of the Minovsky field effect is being complicated by the interference it also generates to the sensors,” Fera’Xero reported.. And then paused. “Wait, no, this structure _is_ known. Ancestors, Captain, Minovsky Radiation is Polaron radiation and those are _Polaron beams._ Low power, but the signature is exactly the same. That’s why they’re going through shields like they’re not there. The fundamental physics of the weapons are identical to those used by the Dominion.”

“Find a way to do _something_ about that, or we are going to be in a _great_ deal of trouble. Pass word to Engineering, the situation just got _much_ more complex. Data-packet to higher command as well.” _Just in case the reinforcements end up having to be the ones avenging us._

“Pinging to engineering now, Captain,” Fera’Xero replied.

Anna’s voice came on a moment later. “Captain, I’ve got the information. We are _probably_ capable of considerable resilience anyway, because the self-healing armour is meant to endure much greater punishment than weapons of this energy output can deliver.”

In front of Zhen’var on the viewscreen, the violent turning and firing of the Red Comet and Lar’shan continued. They were _still_ going at it, without one or the other getting the upper hand.

“We have already lost all but one of the CAP.” Zhen’var replied to Ana, while she watched the tactical displays. “Prepare to open fire as soon as you have a lock, Tactical.”

“...the Major’s fighter is masking my optical targeting with that high rate of manoeuvre,” Daria answered in frustration.

“ _Captain,_ there has been a series of bulkhead subdivision failures on Decks One and Two. We’re getting open blast door alarms,” Anna’s voice was suddenly worried, and confused, and not at all focused on the Minovsky field problem.

“ _Fix them_ , and alert security in the event it is not a failure,” Zhen’var replied, feeling terse.

“Understood, dispatching damage control teams, Captain, I think it’s…”

Before anyone else could do anything, the doors to the bridge opened as alarms _howled_ down the corridors, warning of blast doors improperly opened at ZEBRA.

The Captain’s hand flashed to the holster at her belt as she slapped the quick release on her restraints, reflexively rolling to the side. The first _Huáscar_ had led her to work out a drill with Fei’nur on how to respond personally in such an event, as her mind skidded off-track in sudden alarm.

Standing there in a humble Mumbai-style sari that she’d replicated for herself was Lalah Sune, her face filled with panic and utter intensity. “ _Captain,_ you must contact Char! This is all a terrible misunderstanding!”

Elia had the most warning of anyone on the bridge except Daria, and at ops without orders was more free to act; she’d already risen and drawn her sidearm when the woman burst onto the bridge, shouting.

For a moment, the two gazed at each other--and both froze.

“Ops, do what you deem best.” Zhen’var’s voice came out over-controlled and flat as she kept her pistol trained on Sune from the deckplates. She _recognised_ that posture in Elia.

“Computer, Override ORX-149 Saumarez Priority Algeciras for the ZEBRA interlock on the Manual Astrogation Access Tube,” Elia spoke sharply, and measured, and Lalah dashed to her side, wordlessly.

The small Mumbai woman flush up against her, Elia turned for the unlocking access hatch off the bridge, and began to climb with her through the doglegs in the armour, as fast as she could.


	3. Act 3

# Act Three

  
  


Elia reached the top of the tube, and the beautiful dome with its precise optical instruments which could be used for navigation to the bridge in a true emergency, partially protected by heavy glacis plates flaring up from the armour over the bridge. She pulled herself to the top, helping Lalah with her.

Idly, as she spun the dome around based on the tracking information from the bridge, Elia wondered if she could put Lalah into a pair of gloves. The woman’s nudity was profoundly embarrassing to her. The distraction quickly added to layers of embarrassment in an urgent time.

< _My apologies, Lalah,_ > she offered, the woman having felt the sentiment that Elia offered in close proximity. She did not reply, her worry suffused through them both.

Now, they had the view of Lar’shan and Char’s indecisive duel in close-up, and with that magnification, Lalah turned, her eyes widening in relief. Elia could feel that she hadn’t believed that she would live, that any of this could work. She was hopeful, excited, even, that Char was alive, even as Elia could feel the connection with another, a young man named Amuro.

And then she felt Char. The two together in the astrogation dome meant that the contact leapt to both of them, something that, as they were in physical contact, they both felt. Char was electrifying. Not incredibly powerful, but still powerful, and more importantly clearly _there,_ and so _alive._

His burning passion was like a flame in his mind, his psyche was given over to the intensity of his emotions, pride, chivalry, revenge. And he felt her, too. The burning need to prove herself among mundanes, the lust for the stars and a ship under her boots. The years of oppression that her psyche were shaking off, like a ten thousand tonner shakes off a great wave, at first rolling under and seeming to be lost, and then rising and lunging forth in a vast mound of spray.

< _Char, break off. I live, I am fine, I was their guest._ > Lalah’s sentiment flashed through them both, even as Elia was embarrassed to have something of an instant crush on her young guest’s boyfriend, a man only several dozen leagues higher in her estimation than her ex-husband, more or less instantly.

< _Mmn, it’s all right,_ > Lalah’s mind was all laughter and confidence.

< _A human Newtype… From another universe,_ > Char marveled for a moment. < _Why did you come to us? > _

< _To stop the killing. And you, Char, must stop now. Pull back. Make peace. Before it is too late,_ > Elia answered.

< _You know she is right,_ > Lalah added emphatically.

< _I want to see the end of this duel..!_ >

< _Shake his hand as a friend instead, and meet an alien of the same temper as your own soul. You have no quarrel with him, only the friendly rivalry of the joust._ >

The crew of the _Huáscar_ did not know what had happened, but abruptly the red Mobile Suit broke off. It spun away and burned hard for his cruiser _,_ and an open comm-link activated over radio channels to the _Huáscar_ from the tiny suit.

“This is Captain Char Aznable. I accept Commander Saumarez’s offer of a truce. Contact me when I have returned to the _Zanzibar,_ and I will make arrangements to come aboard your ship to parley, and secure the return of Ensign Sune.”

  
  
  


The _Zanzibar_ came alongside the _Huáscar_ about an hour later, slowing into position. The pilots of the three downed fighters had been recovered and the situation was stabilised, with the _Huáscar_ still at general quarters. She remained so until the transport took place; only once the _Zanzibar_ ’s commander was aboard did Zhen’var feel safe authorising Condition Yellow. In the meanwhile, their Mha’dorn mental hygienist was personally watching over Lalah, after Elia had briefed Zhen’var.

The transporter Chief homed in on the designated position which was supplied by the Zeon cruiser a minute later, and beamed aboard one life sign. For the first time, in person, Zhen’var, Fei’nur, Marine Lieutenant Koi’sar of the Mha’dorn, and Daria saw this man, a living legend who had destroyed three fighters despite being massively outmatched in technological capability. A man who had arguably had achieved a miracle by not killing any of the three pilots in doing so, though how much was a result of the disparate technology and how much luck and blind chance was impossible to tell.

Char, for his part, looked at four aliens of two species. He was silent for a moment, in his samurai-styled helmet and mask over a red piloting uniform inscribed with the rising bird of Zeon. Then he removed his helmet and bowed politely. “I will test your sincerity, but I appreciate the hospitality nonetheless, Captain Zhen’var.”

“Major Aznable, welcome aboard. I will _forebear_ comment on your attack on my fighter screen. Shall we adjourn to a conference room to discuss the return of the Ensign, and the general situation while we hold truce with each other?”

“Yes, that will be acceptable.” He was as inscrutable as ever under his mask, but an almost radiating sense of poise, intensity, confidence came from him. He glowered a little even so. “Will Ensign Sune be present in the conference room, Captain?” Char added, pausing as they had started to walk from the transporter room.

“After the preliminary discussion, that is possible, Major. Verses and maths twirled inside her head, as Fei’nur gave him a glower right back, looking ready to flatten the _human_ who dared to act so.”

“Very well.” He started to walk again, regarding Fei’nur very calmly. His hidden eyes meant he revealed little, but his poise was of a similar ken to her own. “Your interuniversal technology is a marvel for the ages. The only astonishing thing was that I saw that humans still live on planets when Ensign Sune reached out to me. Really, with this technology you could build a thousand worlds for every one which is needlessly polluted by a human presence.”

“There are some cultures which choose to live mostly in space, but most have emotional ties to the homeworld and usually have at least a managed population upon it. My people have had no choice.” She kept her thoughts tightly guarded, whirling nonsense about her head to provide the best blocks a mundane could.

“Yes… _Emotional_ ties.” He said no more in response, though the word implied, not truly dismissiveness, but perhaps a frustration. And then they were in one of the conference suites, with food prepared. Nah’dur was waiting for them. By a certain level of irony, none of the humans in the crew were available for the meeting, they could not be spared from their duties.

“Surgeon-Commander Nah’dur, Major. Please, sit.” She moved to her own chair, as Fei’nur moved to stand at readiness beside her. “We have some _basic_ understanding of the situation from Ensign Sune.”

“She’s not stupid, Captain,” Char replied levelly before moving to sit, folding his legs and seeming unconcerned. “The reality is this: Earth abused the Spacenoids, negotiated a treaty with them, and then engineered terrorist attacks as cover for altering that treaty in their favour. Everyone knows it, nobody can prove it, and the Earth Federation uses a shield of lies to justify its behaviour toward the space colonies. As much to liberate the people of Earth from a rapacious kleptocracy did Zeon go to war as to secure the independence of the Spacenoids. It would be better if _everyone_ was a Spacenoid, Captain.”

“They are not. And there is the matter of the kinetic bolide attacks, Major.” She folded her hands before her, interlacing her fingers. “They are unacceptable to my government, as is the ongoing mass death amongst the non-combatant population.”

What of Char’s face was visible ceased to have any expression at all. “What are you intending to do about it, Captain?”

“Preferably to broker a mutually acceptable cease-fire leading to an armistice.” Zhen’var spoke levelly. Her orders were not exceptionally _palatable_ to her, but they did not rise to the level of her feeling a moral imperative to disobey.

“Is that all you’re going to do? It seems like you’d rather threaten Zeon,” Char replied. It was _true,_ but the chance of it being his reading her mind was quite unlikely; it was inference from the dribs and drabs of surface emotions, and being a canny judge of people anyway. “Do you have orders from your government? What is your real intention?”

“I have no interest in threatening Zeon, nor intentions to do so.” That was, by a narrow reading, true. She had been given orders to broker or force a peace that allowed prosecutions for war crimes… something she thought was intended to force her into battle.

“Well then, what about Zeon’s… _leadership_?”

“We are discussing an armistice and my own services in brokering one, Major. Not a peace treaty.”

Char’s eyes narrowed for a moment. “Captain, I hope you realise that I certainly lack any authority to agree to an armistice.”

“Perhaps you should understand that I do not take kindly to mass murder, Major,” Zhen’var replied. “Nor does my government. Zeon is in an unenviable position, and if you are not able to negotiate, it would be wise for you to reach out to someone who can.”

“The House of Zabi will not be inclined to an agreement,” Char replied almost drolly. “I believe I know what the Alliance wants, at any rate. I understand something of your government from Commander Saumarez.”

“I’m sure if you had such a meeting of the minds that Commander Saumarez understands a great deal of you personally as well, Major. That is a two way street for telepaths, as you are doubtless aware--and so am I,” Zhen’var answered. “Will her words verify your own?”

Char stiffened, and opened his mouth to reply. As he did, an alarm trilled in the room. Will’s voice came from the bridge. “Captain, an Earth Federation vessel is approaching on an attack vector. We have identified it as the _White Base._ ”

“An attack vector…” Zhen’var pushed her chair back and rose immediately. “Lieutenant Seldayiv, you are excused from your general quarter. Please remain here as Major Aznable’s hostess.”

“Captain, send me out with your Major Lar’shan, I can certainly fight them at your side!” Char exclaimed, leaping to his feet.

“That will be quite enough, Major Aznable. You will wait here. I have _no intention_ of fighting them.” She spun on heel, and strode from the room.

  
  
  


Captain Noa was staring at the sensor returns, not patient but calm. He was thinking. Gone were any symptoms of hesitation. What he was seeing was unambiguously from beyond Earth-sphere. He could see it in the flowing lines so unlike those of any of the spindly craft of Federation or Zeon, or even the form of the White Base herself. And the size… _The size_!

“She’s onboard the big ship,” Amuro explained.

Bright Noa was no Newtype, but he had had a feeling that was going to be the case. That didn’t make the situation easy, after all, so it was the most likely outcome. The unknown ship was more than two and a half times the length of a _Degwin,_ utterly dwarfing anything except a station. Too lean, too much power, to be anything except a ship. If that vessel was Zeonic, the pursuit had been necessary, and had also exposed the White Base to almost certain destruction.

The likelihood of it being Zeonic was high, because of the _Zanzibar_ -class cruiser laying close off of her. It was that combination which settled the scene for Bright. Sayla and Amuro had been right, and now the war hung in the balance. “Pilots, prepare to go to your stations. They have certainly already detected us.”

Amuro turned toward Bright instead. “Captain, they’re _not_ Zeon.”

“They’re certainly acting like it, _Ensign,_ and the slightest hesitation might mean our deaths.”

Sayla, too, hesitated, looking sharply at Captain Noa.

“Don’t tell me you think they’re..”

“They’re extrauniversal,” Amuro said, _feeling_ through the link what Lalah felt, what she felt now. “They are, Captain. We just need to tell them the truth about the Federation and Zeon!”

“This is a risk to the entire ship and the entire Federation. If you’re…”

“Captain,” Fraw Bow looked up, urgently. “They’re hailing us, and you’ve got to see it to believe it! Their Captain is an alien!”

“What?” Bright hesitated for a moment, looked to the two Newtypes next to him. _If…_ “Put it on,” he ordered simply. The future of the Federation might truly be at stake.

  
  
  
  
  


“I am Captain Zhen’var of the Alliance vessel _Huáscar_ .” The face looking out of the viewscreen was _assuredly_ an alien one, feline eyes piercingly fixing on Captain Noa. “Earth Federation ship, I shall defend myself if necessary, but I do not mean to take offensive action against you. Please advise of your intentions.”

“...We are pursuing anticipated Zeon contacts, Captain Zhen’var,” Bright answered. He wanted to think this was some kind of trick by Zeon, but that… That was an alien that he was looking at. _First contact._ “I am Captain Bright Noa of the _White Base,_ Earth Federation Space Forces. I had _not_ anticipated a foreign vessel to be laying alongside a Zeon cruiser. Earth is in the middle of a grave and terrible war, Captain.”

“I am aware. I am charged with my government with bringing an end to the mass deaths of civilians at any hazard. The Zeon cruiser is under truce to negotiate with myself, I extend to you and your ship the same courtesy.”

“You won’t be able to hold a truce with Zeon if you intend to halt the mass death of civilians, Captain. We are in the midst of serious military operations from which I cannot detach the _White Base_ for long. If you can guarantee that the Zeon vessel will not reenter hostilities, then I will withdraw back to my operational duties and leave you to keep their peace,” Bright replied. “This will also give the Earth Federation an opportunity to make appropriate preparations and assign Ministry staff to meeting your own representatives.”

“I include Zeon civilians in that charge, Captain Noa.” Zhen’var’s expression did not flinch as she regarded the man before her. She would not be _used_ by one side in an attempt to gain advantage.

“The Earth Federation stands for the principles of universal sapient rights. We will not destroy Zeon’s habitats in the same way they have ruthlessly attacked those of Loyal Sides and even Neutral ones. They gassed the inhabitants of three Colonies in preparation for Operation British, Captain Zhen’var. Sixty million dead, they killed five of their own Spacenoids for every person who perished in the...” He trailed off, not sure how to explain the Holocaust to an alien and not sure he wanted to, and unsure of what the ship’s name and the humans on the bridge meant for how much of human history this alien woman knew.

“It is true that Zeon’s leadership has committed great crimes in the pursuit of a goal their people supported.”

“Are you telling me, then, that you would stand between the Earth Federation and the successful conclusion of this bloodshed?” Captain Noa, in no way, wished to admit how young and inexperienced he actually was.

“If necessary, but I would prefer not to be forced to precipitous action, Captain.” The Dilgar woman watched him warily through the pickup, taking measure of her opposite number. “My understanding of the situation is still incomplete.”

The young blonde and blue-eyed woman in uniform at his side stepped forward. “Captain, we need to make sure they understand or anything we do…”

Bright held up his hand. “That’s enough, Flying Officer. Yes, Captain Zhen’var, I will bring a delegation aboard your ship to meet with you and explain the situation, understanding, I trust, that time is short. If you could help with our burn back toward middle-band orbits, I could guarantee you enough time to resolve this. We have plenty of evidence of the crimes of Zeon, and the Earth Federation is prepared to negotiate fairly with your nation.”

The woman’s expression was thoughtful, before she nodded once. “For now, that is provisionally acceptable. Fall in at my starboard side.” _At least then I will separate the two._

Bright nodded, and looked a little relieved. “Very well. Helm, stand by to come about to starboard and commence a burn to one klick off the starboard beam of the _Huáscar_!”

Mirai Yashima’s competent and eager voice answered crisply. “Aye-aye, Sir!”

“When we are in position, I will comm again to make arrangements to quickly come aboard,” Bright promised. “Thank you, Captain.”

When the screen blinked out, Arterus shook his head. “Elements, Captain. They’re all so _young._ ”

“The pre-war cadres were likely wiped out. These are the ensigns and cadets who had to step up to lead when all else was lost. We knew the same by the time of Third Balos, Commander.”

Elia shot a quiet look to her Captain. Once, a long time ago in another life and another country, _she_ had been one of those cadets, thrown in when all else was lost. Though she would not, now, allude to it, her friend could tell from the tenor of Zhen’var’s voice that a little bit of her memories of the Line had crept in, bleeding out of that medal on her chest.

  
  
  
  


With the situation what it was, Elia was sent to greet the cadre from the _White Base_ when they beamed aboard. Bright, Sayla, and Amuro, they could spare no-one else, and Bright Noa wanted the people who had _felt_ the crazy events which had led him here, directly at his side.

Elia came to attention. “Captain Noa. I am Commander Elia Saumarez, representing Captain Zhen’var for the Allied Systems Vessel _Huáscar._ ”

“No salut… Commander Saumarez. Forgive me, you have different customs, of course. The Captain is still meeting with representatives of Zeon?”

“Representative--but yes. This way, please.”

< _You’re a Newtype too!? From another universe!? > _Amuro’s bright mental voice and the spillage of thoughts, including ones about Lalah, made Elia blush.

< _Discipline, young man, > _ she sent back. < _Don’t bloop all over the place. > _

< _Blooping? What’s … oh. > _He caught the mental sense of it and clamped down, looking embarrassed.

In a few minutes, the three Earth Federation officers drew up sharp and short to see Char Aznable lounging in a chair and snacking on satay and tea, in the flesh.

When Elia saw the look that passed between the masked man and Sayla Mass, she stiffened. More than a look had passed between them. So had a bond. Amuro, with his awakened powers but something of a sense of obliviousness, caught it but did not understand the significance. < _Koi’sar, they have a long history, > _she glyphed to the other Mha’dorn.

“Captain Zhen’var? I’m Captain Noa, and this is Flight Officer Sayla Mass and Ensign Amuro Ray.”

“Captain, Ensign, Flight Officer. Please, sit. What would you prefer for refreshment? I understand time is important for both sides, we are preparing to alter course towards the inner orbits as we speak.” She remained polite, watching the Earth group carefully.

“She wants to negotiate a peace,” Char said, faintly bemused. “Dangerous woman, though. Has a very dangerous pilot onboard.”

Amuro and Sayla looked at each other.

< _Anything at all you want, we can generate through matter replication, > _Elia explained.

“... Oh, some Chinese tea, then,” Amuro specified after a moment.

“Moroccan mint tea,” Sayla said very softly.

Nah’dur shot a look at the young woman--and another at Char, who had asked for the exact same beverage and was currently drinking it.

Zhen’var nodded to the steward at the replicator then, and folded her hands before her. “Peace is an _optimal_ outcome, yes. Major Aznable and Ensign Sune have thus far given me the point of view of the Duchy.”

“A tyranny founded on a base perversion of the principles of Zeon Zum Deikun and on his own murder,” Sayla said sharply. Char didn’t interject. “A ruthless, scheming family, half clinically insane, who eliminated the founder, entrenched totalitarian hereditary rule blatantly, and then executed a war of mass murder, from start to finish, without the slightest constraint of human rights except those forced upon them. A humiliation and a shame to Spacenoids everywhere and an utter perversion of the true objective of Contolism.”

“Perhaps. The _people_ of Zeon will need to decide their future path once the war is brought to an end, that is a matter we can find agreement within, I hope.” Sipping at her tea, she gathered her thoughts behind the swirling cloud of mantras that protected them from the Newtypes that filled the room. “A return to early principles for the Sides would not be unacceptable to the Federation, I expect?”

“An agreement on governance was signed, and the Federation as always upheld it,” Bright answered.

“That…” Sayla trailed off, silencing herself in the face of her superior officer.

“Is not quite true,” Char continued smoothly. “It’s not the real agreement, Captain Noa, everyone knows that, it’s just that nobody can prove it. The Federation _has_ committed _many_ crimes against Spacenoids.”

Noa gritted his teeth.

Amuro leaned forward. “Captain Zhen’var, ma’am… Where is Lalah Sune? We followed her here, is she all right?” The name came to him naturally.

“She’s _fine,_ ” Char interjected. “We are talking about serious matters, Ensign Ray. The Newtypes of this vessel are caring for her until we come to an agreement, and I want to get her released.” There was a warning glare even with the mask.

The Dilgar woman at the head of the table glanced between the persons present. “The matter is both serious and time-critical, none can doubt that, but _you_ are the ones present representing your nations. Peace is an _ideal_ , but I _will_ intervene directly if we cannot reach agreement.”

“You will, will you?” Char straightened in his chair.

“I can feel that she will,” Amuro countered, glaring at him.

“Look, there are two different interests here,” Sayla said abruptly, her mind made up. “There’s the House of Zabi, and there’s the people of Zeon. And nobody here can make an agreement for the House of Zabi, nor should they, but…”

Char pushed himself to his feet. < _Sayla, stop! You’ll ruin… > _

Elia stared at him, and abruptly he felt a constricting block bringing his own uneven power to a sharp halt.

“...But _he_ can make an agreement for the People of Zeon,” Sayla continued, pointing a finger at Char. “Because he’s Casval Rem Deikun, the eldest child of Zeon Zum Deikun. Don’t try to stop me, Casval, I know why you’ve been living this lie and it’s just going to get you killed and all that’s left of father’s dream destroyed! Here’s your chance! The Zabi are finished if this ship intervenes, don’t deny it, _here’s your chance_!“

“Officer Mass!” Bright leapt to his feet.

“Call me by my real name,” she said softly, so very, very softly that it was almost a whisper. “Call me Artesia Som Deikun. Casval’s safe now, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter…” She sank back into her own seat, as the pandemonium washed over them all.

An audible growl came from the woman at the head of the table; “ _I shall have silence! ”_

The room’s noise drifted away until a pin could be heard dropping. People looked around the table in varying degrees of shock, bewilderment or confusion.

“You told me he was your brother, Sayla,” Bright said softly, finally, into the quiet. “But…”

“Well. It seems we have a possibility for peace.” Her eyes turned to the man who she had known as Char Aznable. “My _orders_ are to ensure that no peace _prevents_ the trial of those responsible for either ordering or committing war crimes.” The glare she was giving the man softened slightly as her thoughts fell into place, by how the man spoke before. “You _are_ intending to avenge your father and his dream on the Zabi leadership, are you not?”

“Well, two of them are already gone,” he answered mildly. “Are you prepared to make an agreement, Captain Zhen’var? Because I can certainly help. Gihren’s defence plan around A Bao a Qu includes equipment the Federation is unprepared to face.”

“What are they planning?!” Amuro’s eyes widened.

“Agreement first,” Char chuckled, ignoring Bright’s stiff-necked look.

Zhen’var looked at the man’s covered eyes with a firm, level expression. “We can reach an agreement. I expect it to be respected in _spirit_ as well as letter.”

“I want the House of Zabi destroyed,” Char finally admitted, explicitly. “So far I have seen only two of them fall. There are three left. But I will not permit the destruction of Zeon.”

“I have come to a similar conclusion, Major. I am given to understand that the two children are unequivocally guilty of sufficient crimes to see them fl… given a death sentence by any rational court. Do you agree with that assessment, Captain Noa?”

“There’s a lot more than just those two…” He stiffened. He wasn’t being asked that question, and he didn’t have the authority to lay down the law here. “Yes, we can unambiguously provide plenty of evidence to hang both Gihren Zabi and Kycilia Zabi. And Sovereign Degwin, of course, bears total command responsibility.”

“He may be of the age where a greater revenge would be taking his children from him.” She shrugged, glancing to Nah’dur. It was a very _Dilgar_ thought, as she had decided upon her course, then turned upon it with an iron will. “If you accept this, Major, then we have the basis of an agreement. _Now_ is the time for objections from _anyone_ here.”

“There are none. If the Zabis are killed and Casval reveals himself, he can negotiate an equitable peace for Zeon. The people will follow him and are exhausted by war,” Artesia said flatly. “Already, he is the only man who could launch a coup d’etat. This removes the risk of failure, but we must act quickly. Brother, what are they planning at A Bao a Qu?”

“I want a guarantee that actions against the Zabi family will not negatively impact the peace… Status-quo antebellum for Zeon,” he observed, looking to Bright.

“Do whatever you want to those monsters, _Casval,_ ” Bright answered. “But you know I can’t speak for the government. Still, Zeon was independent when the war started. You can’t deny that.”

“Just strangled in a blockade. But that won’t happen again, either.” He glanced significantly to Zhen’var.

“I have called for, and have reinforcements on the way to assist my command as we speak. The Alliance will look favourably on bringing both _nations_ into the multi-versal trade and diplomatic community.” She used that word _quite_ deliberately as she replied to his look. Captain Zhen’var had long since exceeded her original intentions, but saw it as the best solution. “I shall assist with surgical strikes, Major, to ensure that the criminals do not escape. You have my _word_ upon my clan to this.”

“Very well, Captain. I trust your word.” Casval looked around the table. “Zeon has been completing work on a fusion torch generator which can wipe out an entire fleet, called the Solar Ray. They’re going to ambush your attack on A Bao a Qu with it. That’s what the plan is.”

“I think we have our first surgical strike target, do you agree, Commander Saumarez?” Zhen’var’s expression was a calculating one, as she tapped a few keys before her, to bring up the holo-projector with a local tactical display.

“A Bao a Qu, the monster that guards the tower,” Elia murmured, and leaned in to her own interface. “Yes, Captain. I believe we do.”

  
  
  
  
  


There was no love between the living children of Degwin Zabi. There probably hadn’t been since Kycilia had been six, and seen the way her older brothers had been treated versus herself. _Garma,_ Garma she had cared for. Garma had loved her. Dozle had been an oaf promoted to an undeserved level.

Gihren, she simply held in contempt, waiting for the moment when she would prove herself better than he was. In this moment, however, they needed each other. For a little while longer, at least.

“Brother.”

“Kycilia, false kindness doesn’t suit you,” Gihren turned. The command and control facilities on A Bao a Qu were immense and superb for the battle to come. “Aznable has not returned from the attempt to intercept the alien vessel. Our long-range optical scanners have located, but it’s certainly moved since the last pass and the coverage isn’t good enough. I’ve been holding the Solar Ray in reserve accordingly.”

“What would you use it on?” Kycilia looked up. “Father has been negotiating with the Earth Federation Fleet for twelve hours now. It’s quite likely he has an agreement, or else the truce would have already broken off and the Earth Federation would have attacked.”

“An intolerable agreement,” Gihren sneered. “But it won’t matter. The Solar Ray is better turned on the alien vessel. When we capture a true interstellar ship, we will have _plenty_ of time at Axis before the Federation can advance on it to reverse engineer the vessel and counterattack. There will be no mercy then, we will have the resource base necessary to scour Earth of all human life. The strong will migrate, and the weak will perish.”

“I agree that it’s necessary to capture the alien vessel if we’re going to survive,” Kycilia answered. “However, that means _capturing_ it. Can we be sure firing the Solar Ray at it won’t result in its complete annihilation?”

“Our finest scientists have already analyzed the spectral readings from the optical observation. The hull is made of astronomically thick material. And the Minovsky charge on the laser is used in power storage only. We will have to burn through the shields, but we certainly have the power to do it. After that, we will need their interstellar drive disabled at close range, of course.”

“That will require the use of a mobile suit in the finest hands. A powerful one. And we don’t have Char available, whatever has happened to him.”

“Send Kusko Al with the MSN-02,” Gihren replied simply.

“She was training to operate a MSN-08,” Kycilia replied. “Johnny Ridden is our best pilot available.”

“She’ll be fine. Your precious Ridden isn’t a Newtype and can’t possibly use the MSN-02 to its full effectiveness. What I need from you now, Sister, is warning. The Solar Ray will be capable of disabling the enemy vessel’s shields as it comes in, then we will send in Mobile Suits at close range to cripple it and board. The fleet will cover the evacuation of the prize to Axis. However, a surprise attack on the Solar Ray…”

“You’ll have enough warning to engage. But I need to speak with Kusko Al, now. The MSN-02 is ready for launch, and I will need to cover the situation and the technology if this is the course you take.”

“Very well, I release her to her assignment, you had access to the Dash 02 anyway. But understand that she _must_ be in position when the enemy vessel’s shields have failed.”

“You have no cause to mistrust me, Gihren.” She whirled on heel and strode out.

Gihren waited until she was gone, and then chuckled softly. “For now,” he said softly.

It wasn’t long until one of his officers approached, and saluted. “ _Sieg Zeon_! This delay has proved quite fortuitous, Excellency. We have completed testing of the Solar Ray and several critical power couplings for the re-charging cycle had deficiencies corrected.”

“Very good then.” Gihren grinned. “We shall have the ability to fire in close succession?”

“Now that these repairs have been made, certainly, Excellency.”

“Then it appears we have a little surprise waiting for the Federation as well. Excellent. As soon as we receive confirmation of the approach of the alien vessel, target and fire on warning. There is no purpose in delaying.”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Sometimes dealing with the aftermath of an engagement was a nightmare, with wounded and slain and torn metal everywhere. On a carrier, it could be bad when damaged aircraft crashed aboard, beyond the other dangers which attended to any ship under direct attack--and a carrier need not be under direct attack.

Stasia was guzzling coffee in front of one of the more mundane but true pain in the ass moments she’d ever dealt with in the aftermath of an engagement. They’d lost three fighters but had three pilots back aboard alive. And they were going to be entering a severe test of the ship within a matter of hours. Well, obviously the Captain wanted the wing at full strength. She played with the ponytail she had sticking through the back of her CE7 _Huáscar_ baseball cap (complete with a stylized image of the ship!) and tried to figure out what the hell to do next. Then the entire thing let loose, and Stasia winced.

“Motherfucker,” Chief Dugan said, standing next to her in a matching baseball cap and watching two of their guys go tumbling out of the null grav zone and slam into the deck. They were in full protective gear, but… “Motherfucker.” He sat his coffee down on a crash start cart and jogged over, yelling into his omnitool. “Corpsman to main fighter hangar, Corpsman to main fighter hangar!”

Spare Mongeese were stored on the _roof_ of the hangar, between the main structural frame beams. Their fins and wings were stored in the main cargo bays, and already having been moved by cargo repulsor carts from the cargo bays to the hangar.

The problem was that the authorized way down for the fighters hanging in the roof was to set up a null-grav field generator under them and then uncouple them from the roof and gently push them down to the deck. This worked fine when there was plenty of time, but there wasn’t, and men were botching securing the hooks in fine form to haul them down to the ground, with this last group having fallen ten feet when they caroomed outside of the null grav field.

Stasia shook her head as Chief Dugan made sure that the men were stable for the Corpsman to arrive. They were probably fine, but of course he wanted to make absolutely sure before he chewed their dumb asses out. Now her problem was to still finish getting the last two reserve fighters they needed down from the roof to where her teams of technicians could finish assembling and upchecking in time to join the battle.

Stasia was doing manual controls for traffic around the null-grav field, but now she blocked the entire approach off and jogged over to PO Alvarez, one of the aircraft handling personnel who was operating the null-grav. “Just turn it off, turn it off.”

“Right, Chief.” He shook his head. “Who thought this was a good idea, Chief?”

“Fuck all if I know,” Stasia answered, and walked over to where the Corpsman had now arrived to check the two crewers who had fallen. “Looking forward to that NSF-110, Rick?” She couldn’t resist needling him about the accident report form.

“Oh, you betcha. _You betcha,_ ” he grumbled. “They’re both fine…”

“...But we’ve got to fill it out anyway. Later. Maybe we’ll get blasted to hell first and won’t have to worry about it.”

“Now that’s my Tlingit chick talkin’.”

“Maritime Highway all the way, baby,” Stasia answered, shaking her head. “Look, Rick, I’ve got a plan. I’m interfacing with the computer on the stored fighter, we’re going to have it drop the gear with the null-grav shut off, and we’re just going to throw a fucking grappling iron into the landing carriage, get an eye pulley onto the tie down point, and then haul it down from outside the null-grav field. Once it’s back on. How’s that sound?”

“Aand that’s why you were an officer on a ferry and I was just hauling motherfuckers drinking in the turret control room on a _Nova_ up to the Captain for an NJP _._ Yeah, that might just do it. Look, Stasia, if it even vaguely resembles spotting cars onto a boat, I’m lettin’ ya do it, no questions asked.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and tried to look innocent.

Stasia laughed. “Yeah, you just go right on letting me be in charge. Left-right, left-right and all of that shit.” She tapped the control-commands into her omnitool and watched the gear on the two fighters drop and lock on the roof. Then she tapped open a channel. “Major Kel’dar?”

“...Chief Héen?”

“Sir, do you have anyone who’s good at grappling shit?”

  
  
  
  
  
  


As final preparations were completed, the _Huáscar,_ her situation more certain, had recalled the _Heermann_ for a check of systems before attack launch. When she did, Abebech had gone to Café Varna, her helmswoman tagging along after her. The Attacker’s commander settled herself at the bar.

“ _Karvavitsa,_ ” she instructed to Alexandra. The woman widened her gaze.

“ _Karvavitsa?_ See, now here is a woman of taste.”

“And coffee, good, traditional style, hmm? But tea for the young L’tenant.”

“Yes, yes.” Alexandria hastened off.

Abebech smiled. “You’ll love it, I’m certain,” she offered to Ca’elia, before looking across to a small knot of people at one of the tables. It was Char Aznable--Casval Rem Deikun--with his sister Artesia, and Lalah Sune. Char looked quietly reserved between the two as they carried on an animated conversation.

“I am certain I will, ma’am.” She glanced around with brilliant green eyes, the idea of something like _this_ being on a starship was still almost inconceivable. Almost as much so as asking what karvavitsa _was_ ….

“The House of Deikun,” Abebech observed softly. “They are like nobility themselves, pure and clear in spirit and much better heirs of Zeon than those that took their father’s memory.”

“They went through a crucible that would have seen them destroyed if they stayed, so they learned how to be more than a name. Dilgar nobility did the same, Captain.”

“Learning how to be more than a name is very hard,” Abebech replied quietly. The food came out for them, blood sausage in the traditional Thracian style.

Waiting for her commander to start before she sliced into hers, Ca’elia’s eyes lit up. “It’s so _rich,_ it just melts in your mouth. This is wonderful, ma’am! _”_

“Mmm-hmm, quite delightful, really, L’tenant.” Abebech was smiling. The moment lasted at least a little while. Then Amuro Ray entered. The conversation over at the table grew still, as Char looked up.

Amuro ducked his head away, focused on Abebech, and made a beeline for where she was sitting, with a purposeful stride. “You’re the Newtype I felt on the _Heermann._ Who rescued Lalah.”

“Yes, Ensign, I am,” Abebech said.

“I still don’t feel right, I knew doom, and then it was snatched away,” he answered, hesitantly sitting at the bar.

“Alexandra, kindly get the lad a beer,” Abebech said, and glanced over with sunglassed eyes, as concealed as Char’s. The similarity did not pass unnoticed.

Amuro stared at the table, where the three were now again talking, but in more subdued tones. “I feel like something terrible was supposed to happen and then it was snatched away,” he elucidated.

“Prescience is an inexact science in the best of times, but worst of all when you try to analyze the impact of one universe on another,” Abebech replied. “It will fade. _Living,_ lad, has that effect on all of us. Sometimes it seems very strange, to still be alive. I expect Ensign Sune is dealing with more of it than you, for she was the one who faced down death.” She turned back to her sausage.

L’tenant Ca’elia still looked to the young man, before she picked up another piece of her food. “It’s best not to worry about paths not taken. Temporal mechanics and causality were enough to give a headache every time they came up in class.”

He smiled at the surprising warmth by the alien. “Thank you. I’m still trying to come to terms with it all.” He was only halfway done with the beer when he rose, having made his mind up. “I’m going to go talk to her,” he said, and started off.

Behind his back, Abebech exchanged a look with Ca’elia. She suspected the young Dilgar could figure out where this was headed as well as she could.

She leaned over to whisper in the quietest Dilgar she could, “Captain, what should I do if they start throwing punches…?”

“Oh, don’t worry, we’d have some fun then, but I think there’s only one chance in ten,” Abebech answered back softly. Her lips curved into a wicked grin, though; the question had genuinely amused her.

“Lalah,” Amuro began. “I still can’t believe the connection that we had together, even when facing each other like we did. I think it was something…”

“Meant to happen? Yes,” Lalah continued his sentence for him. “It was meant to happen. I’ve been speaking about it with Char and Artesia. We share something, and it was unique.”

Amuro managed a smile. “I thought that I had already lost you when I realised you had been saved. Come back with me to the _White Base_ when this is over, then.”

“No,” Lalah answered. “I made my decision to die for Char already, Amuro. What passed between us as Newtypes isn’t going to change that. Surviving unexpectedly because of something beyond the fate of this universe isn’t going to change that either. Amuro, there’s so much we don’t understand… But a girl doesn’t fall in love because of a cosmic sense of perfection. That’s just the way it is in Bollywood, not in a living heart. Char saved me when my life was hopeless, we’ve shared things that nobody else can understand, too. I value loyalty in who I am, in my culture. There are things that … You can, and will, value more than a single moment of ineffable connection with another. I want to keep those things with Char.”

Amuro stared in shock, and then shot a glare at Char that looked like it could have turned him to ash on the spot. “You’ve had so long…”

“Amuro!” Sayla--Artesia, but he wouldn’t be able to deal with that for months, or years--snapped. “Come on now. Lalah is a free woman, being a Newtype, these mysteries we are learning together, can’t change that. The connection you shared with her, and I’m sorry my friend, just doesn’t change the fact that she wants to spend time with Char, to love him, _anyway._ ”

“You’re just saying that because he’s your brother, Sayla!” Utterly hurt, and spent, Amuro watched in a kind of emotional funk as Char rose, and in a courtly gesture, took Lalah’s hand and helped her to her feet.

“She’s saying that because she’s smarter and more rational than both of us,” Char interjected. “Ensign, with all due respect, I’m not upset about the fact that you share a Newtype bond with my girlfriend… And you need to figure out how to deal with the fact that the woman you share a Newtype bond with is _my girlfriend._ ”

“Our souls are connected, Amuro,” Lalah whispered. “But I am my own woman.” Together with Char, she walked over to where Abebech and Ca’elia were sitting.

Sayla reached out and pulled Amuro down to a seat. “Come on,” she half-hissed. “That’s her decision, if you’re bonded so close, Amuro, you must respect it. Here, I never thought I’d say this in my life to you, but they’ve got some hard stuff here…”

By that point, Lalah had arrived at Abebech’s side. “Commander Imra, I did not have a true opportunity to thank you yet for saving my life.”

“It’s fine, I’ve saved the lives of many Espers before, and I’ve also failed many times,” Abebech replied, looking down at the plate she had just finished. “I take my opportunities where they come, and I long ago learned to leave the failures behind. None of it is personal to me. I am merely glad you are alive, whereas if I had not intervened, you would be dead, and no good would have come it.”

“I will honour the fact that you saved me nonetheless. But if that is really all that you desire… Commander, we must talk about the Flanagan Institute.”

Abebech reached over and slid Amuro’s half-finished beer in front of her, calmly quaffing a solid half of what was left at once. Amuro, watching from the table with Sayla, stared wide-eyed at the gesture.

“Yes, Ensign Sune, let’s talk about the Flanagan Institute,” she said, oh so quietly.


	4. Act 4

#  Act Four

  
  
  


An hour later, Zhen’var’s ready room door trilled and the computer introduced two names rarely heard at once. “Commander Abebech Imra and Lieutenant Commander Elia Saumarez.” There had been a software “update” which had put the computer back on the default of announcing visitors, and Zhen’var hadn’t yet found a way to shut it off again.

Looking up from her desk and the pads there, the Captain’s expression darkened. “Enter!”  _ This cannot bode well if they approach jointly. _

“Captain,” they chorused, both standing at attention before Zhen’var. Elia took a half-step forward. “Captain,” she repeated. “Lalah Sune has told us some critical information which Char--Casval--broadly confirmed, about the Flanagan Institute that Zeon was running in neutral Side 6 territory. The experiments…” She grimaced, “included uploading telepaths against their will into command and control systems and other forms of human experimentation broadly like that the Shadows conducted.  _ Worse,  _ the individual responsible for this line of research appears to have defected to the Earth Federation--which uncritically perpetuated research into the technology.”

“Then we need to stop it, without alerting those who would attempt to hide this man and allow him to escape justice.”

“Fortunately, Dr. Moses himself was killed in a Zeon operation after his defection,” Abebech explained. “I doubt that will stop the research. Furthermore, there is another aspect to it as well. The institute may be near a way to create artificial Newtypes--to modify someone to have Esper senses. Need I say what the dissemination of this technology could do to the multiverse, Captain? It is precisely what I first feared when I came to you.”

“While I find the end result something that does not horrify me, the resulting  _ response _ … we are going to have to stretch ourselves very thin to do all these things, Commanders. I think they must be done, the question is how many do we attempt at once?”

“We could raid the Flanagan Institute with a single ship, the  _ Heermann…  _ Or Casval’s  _ Zanzibar,  _ so we don’t force them to fight their own people,” Elia suggested. “Use the science shuttles, they have transporters and warp drive to scout ahead and can increase her speed by tractor beam assistance, while offering us nothing in a fight.”

“We will use the  _ Zanzibar _ with a liason officer and support from ourselves. Regime loyalists of Zeon  _ will _ likely fight us, I believe… I  _ do _ intend to, if it comes to it, to let him pull the trapdoor lever. I was truthful with him. His soul will not rest until he has his revenge, and denying him it would make us an un-necessary foe.”

“We accrue no immorality by allowing him to act against the House of Zabi,” Abebech replied emphatically. “The only question is taking care that he can lead Zeon to peace when it is all said and done.” 

“His sister seems far more likely to be able to do that, if we may be honest amongst ourselves here,” Zhen’var answered with a shake of her head.

“Granted,” Abebech smiled, and reached out a gloved hand to Elia’s. The woman squeezed it and then took another step to Elia’s desk. 

“Captain, as I discussed with Commander Imra… I feel this mission is very important. Yes, the government wants us to save life, all life. And that’s important. But the beginning of fear, oppression, and utilization; the cycle has started for Newtypes here and we need to disrupt it decisively. Many of the researchers at the institute, like this Dr. Moses, were deeply bigoted men, Ensign Sune has made that clear. I know it will be a disruption to the ship going into battle, however, I want permission to take the  _ Zanzibar  _ to Side Six. After what happened back on Babylon 5… I need to make sure this gets right, Captain. For  _ us _ .”

It only took a moment before Zhen’var nodded. “Permission is granted, Commander Saumarez. You may take  _ Zanzibar _ to Side Six. It is the right thing to do, disruption or not. I am not going to deny you the chance to make such a change in the development of this place.”

“The Independent Command,” Elia smiled. “Thank you, Captain.” 

“I am sure you will do well, Commander. I suggest you get to it, and speak with Casval. He will have some insights on the crew, and a change such as this will disrupt their cohesion. Fei’nur can provide an assault team for you.”

“I’ll need it to maintain the ship under our control as much as to hit the institution. Thank you, Captain. I’ll be about it.” 

“Good hunting, Captain Saumarez. It will not be Algeciras, but everyone has to start somewhere.”

_ Damn the regs.  _  Elia came to attention and saluted, Dilgar style. “Battlemaster, I will bring honour to my command. Place me on leave from my Alliance service, the Warmaster will not mind the wrath of a single world without lightspeed drives and we will make our name well-respected here.”

“Permission granted, Battle Expert. You had best get into proper uniform quickly. Time is short.”

  
  
  


 

An hour later, Elia was on the bridge of the  _ Zanzibar  _ in magnetic boots and a Dilgar Battle Expert’s Naval uniform, contrasting with the Army uniform Fei’nur, technically the ranking officer but not a fit commander for a cruiser, wore when standing next to her. Two full companies of Marines had been brought aboard, the Zeon crew having been spoken to  _ at length  _ by Char beforehand. He had left behind an officer as a symbol of his authority and to interpret the orders, and Elia swallowed at the gesture of confidence that placed her in from the Red Comet:

Lalah Sune. 

Once again in Zeon uniform, but now breveted to Lieutenant, Lalah stood on the bridge in her own pair of loaned  _ Huáscar  _ gravity boots, as crisp as Elia, with her hair pulled back into a smart bun. < _ I wasn’t exactly expecting to be stuck on bridge officer duty. _ >

< _ That’s right, it’s a lot lower prestige than being a ‘Mech pilot here, isn’t it?> _

< _ Yes. Char taught me to have some pride even though that wasn’t really me.> _ She reached into her breast-pocket and pulled out a picture. 

Elia smiled at it. It showed Lalah and Char together, Char as serious and sunglassed as Imra, Lalah blushing a little, somewhere on Earth, gazing recursively at another picture. < _ At this point, you’re fighting to have that again.> _

< _ Yes. I don’t understand the point of war, except when you’re stuck in it, to fight for your loves and comrades. Char’s both.> _

< _ Sometimes people love ideals and nations as much, or more, than friends and lovers.> _ Elia projected an image of Anna’s passionate story of the uprising in Warsaw. 

< _...How strange,> _ Lalah replied. < _ You can’t feel them like a person. Well, Captain, we are here. It’s time for the brief.> _

_ <So it is.> _ Elia’s spine stiffened. An Independent Command, the first. 

The  _ Zanzibar  _ had been accelerated to considerable velocity by the  _ Huáscar _ ’s tractor-beam assist and the orbits were similar enough that a light burn was now underway, separating their trajectories and lining her up to bring what would be a long deacceleration burn to bring them into the neutral zone of Side Six. Sitting on the hull via magnetic clamp were ten science shuttles. 

Elia began her summary brief. “Our destination is the Baldur’s Bay Bunch, two linked colonies in Side Six which have been used for covert research by Zeon. Despite the situation at A Bao a Qu, we know that a Zeonic force was in the area, but they have not executed any recent mission and, quite frankly, Major Aznable didn’t know what their orders were,” Elia explained, briefing both Dilgar and Zeon officers. 

“Our objective is to evacuate the test subjects from this research institute at all costs and prevent the Federation from gaining control of them. Major Aznable has already directed you obey me, the mission is straightforward and we have the appropriate codes. Any questions?” She’d already been over the real secret orders with Fei’nur, in private, before coming aboard:  _ Make sure that the scientists do not escape--to the Federation OR to Zeon. If they are detained, bring them directly to the shuttles to avoid the crew turning on us. And maintain a contingency to seize the ship if they disobey orders. _

The veteran colonel had given  _ her _ orders, taking the one company transferred aboard from back home in the Union as well as one of veterans she had led herself in Drachenfeldt. Her orders called to mind the old Imperium, which Fei’nur minded not at all.

“This mission will materially aid in Char’s plan for the future of Zeon,” Elia added to the Zeonic officers of the  _ Zanzibar.  _ “And is therefore critical for our shared success. I must have obedience in ignorance, are we clear?” 

“ _ Sieg Zeon _ !” 

_ Oh, what the hell. They expect it, they want it.  _ She raised her fist. “ _ Sieg Zeon _ ! To your stations. We will commence our de-acceleration burn in twenty minutes.” 

She clanked across the deck with Fei’nur and Lalah following behind, to the private Captain’s suite that had once been Char’s. The  _ Huáscar _ ’s Mental Hygienist, Va’tor, was inside. She’d already swept the room for bugs. “Battlemaster, Battle Expert. The room’s clear” 

“Thank you, Hygienist-Commander,” Elia addressed her formally. “All right. I want to make it clear, Fei’nur, that I need your best company commander to stay on board, because  _ I  _ need to be going to the Institute--Lalah and Va’tor will go first, but ultimately this is a big enough job to need my personal help. We need to make sure the Newtypes there will actually trust and follow our instructions. And resistance has to end in minutes, if not seconds. We have the advantage of transporters and we’ll need to use it aggressively. Leftenant Sune and Hygienist-Commander Va’tor will need to accompany the first wave to make sure the Newtypes in the facility respond positively.”

“Combat Master Kei’dar will serve well for that. You intend my fire-teams to seize the local areas immediately, then. We can do that, if we can get a layout to match to our insertion plan. Otherwise, Battle Expert, it will be minutes, not seconds. You have my apologies.” 

“I understand, Battlemaster. I trust you with the rest of the details--they are your right to decide on and execute, and mine to follow. My own mission, then, is to make sure you are supplied with the best possible layout charts from the sensors of the shuttles, correct, ma’am?”

“Correct. That will allow me to give you the best chance to gain the support of the Newtypes while I am neutralizing the guards and scientists. Leftenant Sune has already provided the overview and a writeup of her recollections. They will be adequate if the scans don’t come through.” 

Lalah smiled in thanks at the praise.

“Understood. Now, we just need to avoid Federation attacks, other Zeon forces, and the Riah Republic deciding that now is the time to start violently enforcing their neutrality” Elia smiled mirthlessly. “Feels a little bit like Lord Gei’lar must have, going out to declare the Woman-Emperor to the people of Ogkharin?” There was no greater example of a situation from the Dilgar historiography describing a moment in which one expected a blade from literally every quarter. 

“It will… yes.” Fei’nur’s face broke into a smile. “I will ensure it is dealt with, even so. I have a charge from the Captain to ensure you are successful, Battle Expert. Mha’dorn business, I am told.”

Elia winked to the Hygienist. “That’s one way to put it,” she laughed, “And a good enough one, too. Thank you, Battlemaster. I will return to the bridge now. You will get a two minute warning for the deacceleration burn.”

“Oh, it’s like basic training. How  _ fun _ …” She still seemed in good spirits, as she turned to depart herself.

  
  
  
  
  
  


Traveling in company with the  _ White Base,  _ the  _ Huáscar  _ approached openly while the  _ Heermann  _ stood off her starboard quarter under cloak. The threat that the Alliance cruiser posed to the enemy would have been incalculable if it hadn’t been for the risk of coming under fire from Minovsky beam weapons. That made the fight considerably more ominous. 

Down in the main science labs, Anna Poniatowska and Fera’xero were still working together when Zhen’var arrived, at consoles with a team of both scientists and engineers around them. Anna didn’t even look up as Zhen’var entered, instead just guzzling another pull from her mug of (presumably coffee) as she adjusted controls and re-entered new parameters, linked into the interface and ran another sim. 

“I apologise for interrupting, but we are going into action. We have received serious new intelligence, the enemy has some type of fusion torch generator designed to wipe out an entire fleet, and I expect it to have been holding a charge to aim at  _ us _ .” Zhen’var explained without preamble, her features taut.

“The rumours said we were trying to hit it before that happened, Captain,” Anna grimaced. “Fera’xero and I are almost on the verge of developing a shield auto-skipping implementation across frequencies which will prevent the instantaneous degradation that is the hallmark of Polaron/Minovsky fire. I’m going to guess we don’t actually have a chance to wait? I mean, we can implement it now, but…”

“We haven’t tested it, Captain,” Fera’xero added a bit glumly. 

“Deploy it, we do not have a choice. Commander Saumarez is already detached on independent command. Long-range sensors indicate that  _ something _ is happening in the area of the two fleets squaring off.”

“We might all die,” Anna muttered. “Of course, Captain.” She cleared her throat and started to sing, and not in Polish either, but an old Lithuanian song of the Commonwealth. The auto-translator did the job admirably: “Oh, dear rowan tree, where have you been growing in the middle of the swamps…?  _ Ei, ei, ajajaj,  _ in the middle of the swamps..” The rest of the lyrics continued in particularly bloody fashion:  _ Oh, dear mother, what have you raised me up for? What have you raised me up for and conscripted me to a war?  Conscripted me to a war and have forged me three trumpets?  _

She slapped a final command into the computer and grinned. “It’ll hold, of course, Captain. You have my word. All right. I can report to engineering and make preparations to go to quarters.”

“Thank you, Commander. We will be in very heavy action, even if the shields hold. I will be addressing the crew very soon. You both have done well, and I wish I could give you the rest you both deserve.”

Anna tossed a chipper salute over the shoulder. “I’ll just drink a little bit more coffee, Captain!”

“I’d rather make myself useful, if that’s quite all right, Captain,” Fera’xero answered as well. “The ship needs it. Let me get to the bridge and start some Minovsky detection algorithms for the enemy weapon, I might at least figure out whether or not we risk our shields against it, or find where it is relative to the enemy forces before it’s in position to fire.”

“It improves our odds of survival, so I shall not question that, Commander. I am unsure whether or not we will receive support from the Federation in our efforts, we are somewhat supporting a coup against the Duchy's government.”

“I am familiarizing myself with the briefs now, Captain,” Fera’xero answered as they walked together for the turbolift. “What I knew was already horrifying enough, to be quite honest. Sometimes humanity is amazingly obstinate.”

“That I cannot deny, Commander Fera’xero, that I cannot deny…”

Settling in the turbolift for the ride up to the bridge, Fera’xero continued, thoughtfully. “It would be wild to imagine Quarians collectively generating a war from rapacious oppression of others, an ideology of total abandonment of planets, and a bloody-minded quest for revenge in leadership disputed between three families--which then was resolutely pursued to the bitter end. We are rather more Gersallians. But you Dilgar are, in your own way, very human. No offense intended.”

“A great woman once said Dilgar and humans were similar reflections, that we could have swapped development paths with a few changes. I have found little to indicate she was not correct as yet.”

“I do not think the end of that story has been reached yet, Captain.” He folded his hands as they arrived on the bridge. “Nor our’s. We will find the enemy cannon, though it might be a matter of reacting appropriately, not acting appropriately.” That droll joke hanging in the air, he stepped over to the science station, and left Zhen’var with a moment to regard her bridge crew at stations. 

Her eyes scanned the bridge, and she gave a single nod of approval before moving to her command chair. “Get me the shipwide address channel, please.”

“All hands, this is the Captain. We will soon be going into action against the primary defense line of the Principality of Zeon, and a great weapon, a massive energy cannon fashioned from an entire O’Neil type space colony. The Federation fleet stands no chance against this weapon, but  _ we _ do,  _ Huáscareños. _ This war ends  _ today _ , on terms which stand in concord with those the Alliance holds dearest. Harm’s Way is the Valiant Way, and we are assuredly standing into harm’s way. I have full confidence in you and our ship. Make your final preparations, we shall be going to quarters in a few moments.”

As she finished, Zhen’var smiled tightly. “All right. We’ve got the position of the Solar Ray. Lieutenant Arterria, come about oh-oh-five mark three and bring us to full impulse. Let’s give them a targeting problem.” They would approach from the opposite direction that they had been certainly sighted in by now… Zeon’s tactics were not ready for a fleet which could alter orbit at will, and Zhen’var needed every little bit.

  
  
  
  
  


As Zhen’var’s speech finished coming over the intercoms, Anna looked around, now at Central Engineering Control. “This is going to be the first combat action by the  _ Huáscar  _ in space. We are untested, my children,” she said to her engineering space, gray eyes measuring each one of them in turn in their assembled ranks. “But  _ not  _ untrained. There is armour between us and the enemy. The ship will demand our utmost, so she maintain her utmost power when the Captain pushes her beyond her design limits. She will go  _ far  _ beyond them! I expect to make one-hundred and forty-five percent of design power in every subsystem before failure! You will know what to do to achieve it, and we will give the Captain what she needs to keep us all alive. And when the void comes calling, you will shore the internal bulkheads and keep her fighting fit. You have your charge. God go with you.” She crossed herself. “Stations!” 

The alarms had already started to howl. **Condition Red: General Quarters, Set Material Condition ZEBRA throughout the ship.** Bulkhead doors began to close as warning alarms flashed. The ready storage lockers for the solar torpedoes were brought to combat loading and the magazine locker doors swung into the closed, secure position. In the space of a half-second they could open and the mechanisms gently but quickly move reloads across the gap, to automatically close again another second later. 

At designated muster points throughout the ship, crew on Damage Control parties assembled, putting on their vacuum-proof suits, reserve air tanks, and radiation reflective anti-flash gear. Holding plasma welders, emergency sealing foam, pipe fittings and spanners as well as point fire-suppressant foam emitters, their job was to make sure that anti-fire systems (vacuum or exclusionary gas) were repaired if deranged, that breaches and atmosphere slow leaks were repaired, power-conduits diagnosed and fixed in real time, and the area around critical engineering subsystems sanitized. Junior engineering officers reinforced each group. The  _ Huáscar  _ had thirty teams of fourteen each, twice as many as in previous classes of her rate and reflecting operational lessons of the Nazi War. 

Around them, the bulkheads had finished slamming shut. Each sector of the hull was now its own life support module. Christmas trees in Damage Control central and Bridge operations showed glowing green lights indicating spacetightness across the ship. The inertial damper reinforcement protocols were activated as Anna brought the reactors up to full power. These defence screens improved the resilience of the hull to fire and would be critical if they were brought under sustained attack by weapons which could penetrate their shields. 

One entire company of Marines dispersed through the ship in quick reaction squads, guaranteeing that each hull sector had at least one in it. They were in full combat armour, power armour for a fire team in each, and breathing gear and air tanks for fighting in a vacuum to respond to boarders. 

As each step in the preparations was complete, Petty Officers and technicians were pointing to the position of the indicator and verbally indicating, per Zhen’var’s operational directives, that it was in the correct position. “Radial bulkhead R-12-B, closed!” 

“Indicator Torpedo Magazine three flashtightness, green!” 

“Reactor N-4, automatic SCRAM controls, green!” 

When the Captain called for General quarters, this vast machinery of war was brought into function by the precise activity of two thousand officers, sailors and marines. The time it took to complete readiness was less than three minutes from Condition Yellow to Red and modified ZEBRA to ZEBRA. The shields were energized to full power first in case of surprise attack. On the bridge, there was no indication of any of it except for the changes in indicator lights at some consoles. 

The preparations were totally comprehensive. Pointing fingers and shouting voices cut through the air of each little section, each effort the most critical task for those executing it, the sailors and Chiefs who made the ship live. “Emergency evacuation route markings, glowing!” 

“Sickbay Generator One, on-line!” 

  
  
  
  
  
  


“Major Lar’shan, get your wing airborne!” Zhen’var’s voice echoed in Prifly. Lar’shan confirmed a moment later. “Launching now, Captain! PriFly, commence full deck launch.”

“ _ Full deck launch, confirmed, _ ” Stasia said, pulling her headset down and swinging her chair around to the windows overlooking the tube launch points. With three runabouts already combat loaded and in space along with a dozen fighters, the rest came down to launching full deck strength as rapidly as possible. The abbreviation WC for  _ Wing, Combined (strike)  _ had become Wildcat when verbalised. “Wildcat 3 flight, PriFly Actual, you are go for launch.”

“Wildcat 3 Lead, PriFly Actual, commencing launch.” The pilots gave a thumbs-up signal to the tube operators and tossed a salute. They were flying through the accelerator rails a half-second later. Four out. 

“Wildcat 1, 2, PriFly Actual, go for launch from portside tubes.” Then she swung over to Rocky 2 and 3 on the starboard side, her eyes glued on the indicator board which showed tube readiness and a bank of holo-projections which allowed her to sweep her eyes across the conditions in every one of the tubes as new fighters and bombers  were brought up, spotted, and launched. There was  _ nothing  _ in her entire past life which compared to this experience, the sheer intensity, it was more anxiety than combat, trying to keep track of dozens of crewers moving purposefully across the decks, hands spinning with hand-signals and flashed salutes and thumbs-up as the positioning carts brought the wing into position in a continuous roll of motion. 

Ahead and to the sides of the  _ Huáscar,  _ drive-tail after drive-tail blossomed as she quickly surged to having 60 fighters, 36 bombers and 4 combat fitted runabouts assembled as her CAP and main strike package. CAP was pulled back in with the strike package feeding data back, but reinforced to twenty-four from twelve fighters. The rest were going in with the runabouts providing sensor and targeting support. 

On their sensors, they were now clearly resolving A Bao a Qu and the former space colony which hung near it ever so suspiciously. “Major, your group is in the air, Sir,” Stasia reported with a grin as the last of the flights tore into space. “Good hunting. PriFly Actual, handing over flight control.”

“Wildcat-50 Actual, assuming flight control. Good luck, Chief!”

Of course, there was still one combat craft waiting ready aboard the  _ Huáscar.  _ Inside of the main hangar, Char Aznable sat near his Gelgoog, holding his helmet. And as Stasia turned her attention to the holo, high above his position and invisible in PriFly, he turned to the camera and winked. She couldn’t help but grin. Around him the operations crews were still working to turn the last recovered squadron of CAP, which formed their combat reserve. The grin still on her face, Stasia reached for her coffee. 

  
  
  
  
  


As a telepath, one of Elia’s most prized possessions was her watch. Other than a standard set of simple jewelry and piercings, telepath women in general were forbidden from showing the slightest deviation from being objectified, socially normal, prettied up dolls. But watches had still been in common fashion when the rules were drawn up, and so she had one, a very nice sealed chrono which was marking ship time back on the  _ Huáscar  _ as well as the objective times for the start of the operation. Now it seemed a silly affectation when compared to the Omnitool, but with the complicated de-acceleration burn calculations being double-checked on the later, she had her chrono to keep the time, and she rather liked it. 

Ahead of them spread one of the most beautiful sights that anyone could ask for, at least if they preferred the wonders of manmade objects to those of nature. The forty Bunches of Side Six, eighty Colonies, blossomed like solar flowers, their spreading mirrors concentrating light and shining like a grove in space. This place had a population of 800 million and it was almost untouched by the War, but its neutrality  _ had  _ been repeatedly violated and millions had died--just those deaths were, as a portion of the population, much less than anywhere else in this universe’s humanity. 

That made the flowers so much more bittersweet. Elia looked back at her watch intently, straining into her straps as the deacceleration burn continued. 

“Do we have scans of the Flanagan Institute yet?” 

“Yes, we’re resolving an installation at the position indicated by Lieutenant Sune.” 

“Then dump them into the data-link for Battlemaster Fei’nur immediately,” Elia ordered.

“Zero-zero!” The helmswoman, Lieutenant Keitun, called out. 

“All stop!” The engineers could barely dial down the reactors before the next order. “Execute closure manoeuvre!” Then she tapped her Omnitool. “Battlemaster, we are in position and you should have just received the precision scans.” 

“Commence beam-ins,” Fei’nur ordered on the open line the shuttle pilots were listening for. 

Elia whistled a chord of a song and flashed a thumb’s up to Lalah and Va’tor a moment before they disappeared. 

“The authorities of the Riah Republic are contacting us, Commander, demanding to know our purpose in violating the neutral sphere of Side Six,” her comms Petty Officer reported. 

“Tell them we are evacuating the Flanagan Institute and do not mean hostilities,” she answered, looking out at the vast exchange of Baldur’s Bay before her, the nearer and further colonies of the Bunch now dominating the view from the  _ Zanzibar.  _

“Beam-down status?” Elia asked into her omnitool.

“Third commencing now, Commander.”

And then one of the Zeon crew looked up. “Commander, nine Drakens coming in.” 

“They’re just looking to enforce their neutrality. They won’t be foolish enough to attack,” Elia answered. “Nonetheless, start passive optical targeting.” She tapped the omnitool. “As soon as transports are complete, detach the shuttles, raise shields and arm phasers.” 

Then came a report of something altogether more ominous. “Commander, we’re being hailed by the 116th Assault Fleet, General Rimini commanding.”

“The 116th Assault Fleet? What are they doing here?” The grimace was locked on Elia’s face.

“Ma’am, may I remind you that they can countermand Major Aznable’s orders?” Keitun looked at her … Sharply. 

“Very much so, Leftenant. Well, I’m going to sort it out with the General, personally. You have the bridge.” In her omnitool she tapped a command directing Captain Hei’gur to prepare to disable the crew as she calmly walked over to the private cabin. She really had one chance to keep this from blowing up and it was best to keep the questions to a minimum, so without further ado, she opened the closet and started trying to stuff herself into one of Char Aznable’s spare uniforms. 

  
  
  
  
  


Within the Flanagan Institute, nobody was ready for what happened. They had Lalah’s recollections, they had the scans from the sensors, and for what really mattered, they had overwhelming firepower and total tactical surprise. It might be said that it was a massacre, except that enemy casualties were low because there were few targets. 

The first Platoon sealed the exits, silently and without warning by opening fire, taking overwatch and covering the approaches. The second Platoon hit the researcher quarters. It was  _ there  _ that Lalah and Va’tor arrived, swiftly marking positions of the Newtype subjects in the institute. The  _ third  _ Platoon hit the quarters for the subjects. Finally the weapons and support group arrived outside to reinforce the first platoon. Even using the shuttle transporters, it took only four minutes. 

Fei’nur activated her cloak and personally led the sweep through the quarters of the scientists. As her squad covered her, she went ahead of them, out of sight. A rippling series of explosions followed, neatly covering the fact that she was slashing the researchers to death and then planting the charges behind her to cover it up. Flames soon spread through the luxurious (by spacenoid standard) accommodations. She faced utterly no resistance. As far as Fei’nur was concerned, the best way to see it done was to make it done and done, eliminate the researchers who had  _ used  _ telepaths, eliminate the threat to Multiversal peace with simple, practical acts. And it was what her Warmaster would have wanted, anyway.

The attackers soon realised that there was no significant resistance. “Battlemaster, there were just two squads of security guards and they’ve been dealt with,” her radio squawked as she calmly decloaked, having passed through the residential areas. “Secure the technology examples and data from the research labs and stand by to clear out.” A pause as she switched channels. “Hygienist-Commander, has Battle Expert El’sau arrived?” 

“She wasn’t able to join us, so I’m working with Lalah’Sune directly,” the harried woman answered. “They have an issue in space.”

“An issue. Thank you.” She activated the long-range comm. “Battle Expert? Is there a problem?”

“Yes, Ma’am, and I’m busy!” The channel cut at the same time. 

Fei’nur’s eyes flicked up and her teeth gritted. “Well, we may be on this space colony for a while. At least it seems more pleasant than Balos. There are no Balosians, to start with.” 

The Dilgar Marines around her stiffened. 

“Secure the perimeter. I am certain Battle Expert El’sau will deal with the situation.”  _ She had best. The Captain is surely busy right now. _

  
  
  
  
  
  


As the  _ Huáscar  _ and her attack group closed with the converted colony from behind, every system was at the ready for action. The last squadron of fighters was being regenerated from their CAP patrols and prepared for launch. Torpedo tubes were loaded and held at the ready. The crew stood at quarters, waiting their first experience with space to space action aboard the  _ Huáscar.  _

The fusion block engine that had been added to the converted space colony began to loom on the screen. “Stand by to fire,” Zhen’var directed, wondering if Zeon had butchered their own people to create the Colony Laser. 

“...Captain!” Lieutenant Tor’jar at comms looked up. “We’re being hailed by the  _ Great Degwin.  _ Prince Degwin is contacting us directly and wishes to inform us that he has a truce with the Earth Federation.”

“... _ What!? _ ” Zhen’var looked at the tactical display. The massive Earth Federation fleet… Was being led by one Earth ship.. And one Zeon battleship.

“Hold fire. Put the  _ Prince  _ on-screen.” 

“Yes, Battle--” a pause “Captain.”

The screen flashed over from the external display to the visage of the short, gnarled old man who had spent a life in zero-gravity. In a gaudy royal uniform of Zeon he looked as comic opera as an Italian fascist. 

“Prince Degwin. Understand that I cannot accept the legitimacy of your government,” Zhen’var said peremptorily. “I believe you unlawfully usurped power over the Autonomous Republic of Munzo from Zeon Zum Deikun and arranged his murder, and I have come to an agreement with his son and political heir, Casval Rem Deikun, and daughter Artesia Som Deikun, to arrange your replacement and bring an end to this war. You and your family have much to answer for, Prince Degwin, but I can at least arrange for your personal safety, fair trial, and a guarantee of the safety and independence of the people of Zeon under the terms of the original and accepted declaration of independence from the Earth Federation of ten years before.” 

“Casval and Artesia…” He sank into his command chair. “I abused them so cruelly. I have been responsible for all of their misfortunes in this war. How did they escape? How did you, of all people, interuniversal alien, find them?”

“Casval is nobody else but the Red Comet, Prince Degwin,” Zhen’var replied. “Char Aznable will lead the negotiations with the Earth Federation.” 

“Second communication coming in… It’s identified as coming from General Revil, the Earth Federation Commander.”

“Split-screen,” Zhen’var ordered. The bearded officer’s image resolved itself. “General. I am Captain Zhen’var of the Allied Systems Vessel  _ Huáscar.  _ This was an open channel, so I assume that you heard. We can end this war and end it now. You have already done good work toward that end. But you will now know that certainly, there will be no more fighting.”

“This is an internal Earth Federation matter,” General Revil replied. “Captain Zhen’var, you and your Alliance do not need to intervene. A cease-fire has been arranged.”

“That cease-fire may have been arranged, but the real concerns of Zeon must also be addressed or else wars will merely continue indefinitely in this system. General, we are prepared to be reasonable and provide support to comprehensive disarmament enforcement for Zeon, and the prosecution of war criminals. However, I must insist the Earth Federation Government…”

Degwin’s channel suddenly vanished, the image of the broken old man flashing away in a heartbeat. 

“Science, what just happened?” 

“Captain,” Fera’xero answered, his voice both puzzled and horrified, “there’s been an explosion on the  _ Great Degwin. _ ”

Zhen’var looked back up to the screen and General Revil, but his image had vanished, too. 


	5. Act 5

**Act Five**

 

Elia finished adjusting the Zeon dress uniform, sat at her desk, tightening her gloves, and activated the comm channel. “General Rimini, this is Major Saumarez reporting.”

“Major Saumarez. I’m not familiar with you.” The stiff-necked Zeon officer stared sharply for a moment, and then shrugged. “Why did _you_ violate the territorial zone of the Riah Republic?”

“I was directed by Major Aznable to evacuate the Flanagan Institute,” Elia said in measured tones. “Newtypes are Zeon’s future and we had to secure them.”

“I was given the same orders by Lady Kycilia Zabi,” General Rimini responded, frowning. “Major, have you already taken measures to secure the equipment and data in the facility as well?”

“Yes, certainly. We’ve almost finished loading aboard the _Zanzibar._ Sir, if you enter the space of the Riah Republic, we risk a battle. They are already sending Mobile Suits this way and a Federation Task Force is in the area. Sir, I can complete the evacuation on my own if you provide distant cover.”

“Then we will not have enough _time_ to transfer the subjects and equipment to my squadron to execute our orders.” He looked thoughtful for a moment. “Major, if you are under Char Aznable’s command, I trust you completely. You will link your cruiser to our data-links and follow us when we withdraw to our rally point. The _Zanzibar_ will be the treasure ship, we will be the escort. Is that understood?”

“Yes, General.” Inside, her thoughts had hit a brick wall. _Where are we going, then? I have been hijacked, and I’m also the hijacker…_ “Sir…”

“Not a word. You’ll follow us. You’ll see when you get to the rally point,” General Rimini answered. “ _Is that understood?_ ”

“Yes, sir.” She drew herself up. “ _Sieg Zeon_!”

“ _Sieg Zeon!”_

The image blinked out, and Elia sank back down for a moment before she forced herself up to go out on the bridge. _What the hell have I gotten myself into? But I have no choice; until Zhen’var is done with her own operation, I’m going to have to play this straight._

She stepped out onto the bridge after hastily changing back to her Dilgar uniform.  “Crew, excellent news! General Rimini has confirmed our orders, as expected. The Alliance between the Alliance of Systems and Zeon continues as Major Aznable foresaw. Once we have completed our recovery of personnel we will be withdrawing in company with General Rimini’s fleet. The welcome and regular order you will find should leave you absolutely convinced that this mission was planned and approved as a collaboration between our peoples at the highest leadership by the lawful government of Zeon.”

From a certain point of view, it was even true. Considering these crewers were all loyalists to Char… They might just keep believing what they wanted to hear for long enough to make it work. As long as they had faith that they were following Char, she was certain that they wouldn’t turn against her and her Marines. _Now, if only I knew what was happening with the Huáscar…_

  
  


Gihren had been preparing for this for a while. His father was a liability, and he was no worse of a liability than when he was considering a cease-fire with the Earth Federation. Gihren had made absolutely sure that he was going to be removed as a problem, eliminated as an obstacle to the ultimate triumph of Zeon.

Now with the fleets in position and his father declaring on an open channel that he had a cease-fire, Gihren had no choice but to act immediately. He personally brought up the access codes, and sent the detonation command, to a bomb smuggled aboard the _Great Degwin_ as a contingency operation.

There was absolutely no expression on his face when he did. He remained perfectly calm as the eruption of nuclear fire was tracked by the sensors on A Bao a Qu.

“Sir! Prince Degwin’s flagship…!”

“My father?” Gihren said, his voice as falsely sauve as ever when he wasn’t giving a speech. “What has happened?”

“It has been destroyed in a nuclear attack, Sir!”

He _could_ spend time justifying the situation to his people, but he did not expect that the alien vessel would _give_ him the time. He would instead let the timeline of events be absolutely clear-cut, and use that to allow the necessary conclusions to be drawn.

“Treason! The Earth Federation attacked my father to destroy our power and disrupt his agreement! The Solar Ray is to open fire on the Federation fleet.”

  
  


“Captain, power surge from the Solar Ray cannon!” Fera’xero leaned forward. “It’s dreadnought-scale power, Captain!”

“Target?!” Zhen’var watched the nuclear flames flick across the remains of the _Great Degwin._

“The …”

Arterus brought up the parabolic on a split screen. “The Federation fleet.” Suddenly the image of General Revil’s flagship vanished as well, and with it, more than a third of the concentrated Federation fleet, wiped out in the space of seconds.

“The _White Base?_ ” Zhen’var thought of Artesia, Bright Noa, Amuro, the ship which contained their hope for a negotiated settlement with the Federation.

“Outside of the attack arc,” Arterus confirmed a moment later.

“Captain, the weapon is charging again,” Fera’xero reported, “and this time it’s on a target vector which will destroy the _White Base_ and another third of the Federation Fleet.”

The open channel echoed with a voice, brought on-line by Tor’jar.

“ _Soldiers of Zeon! My father, Degwin Zabi, has been traitorously killed by the Earth Federation after attempting to negotiate an honourable peace for Zeon with them. Our only choice is to use the newly unleashed power of the Solar Ray laser to destroy the Federation utterly and punish them for this outrageous attack. We will have our total vindication in the triumph of Zeon at A Bao a Qu…”_

Zhen’var made a chopping motion across her neck. “I’ve heard enough of that petty little Hitler. Daria, target the Solar Ray and commence fire!”

Daria brought up the full forward Solar Torpedo banks and fired automatic 10-round bursts from each of the four main launchers. Forty torpedoes tumbled across space, accelerating down their final tracks toward the converted Colony.

“Not soon enough, Captain! They’re firing!” Arterus looked at Zhen’var urgently.

Daria glanced back, a sudden inspiration leaping into her head even though it might get her and her entire ship killed. “Captain! Warp drive! Interpose our shields between the _White Base_ and the Laser, create a shadow with our shields!”

“Science, could we survive?”

“Yes, it’s diffuse effect, Captain,” Fera’xero answered. “It’s fatal to those ships because of nonexistent armour and no shields.”

“Arterus, course laid in?” Violeta said, her eyes freezing forward in fear but her hands moving quickly.

“You have it, helm!”

“Engage,” Zhen’var ordered, for in this she felt like a weapons release; it was a direct command to risk the ship. Then, grimly, she tapped the ship to ship. “If you don’t hear from me again Commander Imra, _win this battle._ ”

The _Huáscar_ elongated and flung herself into warp for a fraction of a second, reappearing with her shields extended and cast as a wide net to starboard against the oncoming flaring, flashing beam of the Solar Ray.

  
  


“You heard the Captain,” Commander Imra said quietly on her bridge, the _Heermann_ having settled into a nervous, tense silence. “Ca’elia, get us _in close_ with the Solar Ray. Let’s finish the job! Commander Goodenough, stand by to de-cloak…”

Ahead of them, Daria’s torpedoes ripped along the length of the Solar Ray as the second shot finally ceased firing. They punched through the side of the Solar Ray and detonated within. The Solar Ray did not explode; instead, a _beam appeared_ from it, heading toward the _Huáscar_ again. In the intensity of the fire, the crew of the _Heermann_ could not see whether or not their mothership had survived, watching with a numb dread as the weapon seemed to soak up the _Huáscar_ ’s fire without a glimmer of damage.

Abebech lurched in her command chair as she understood what had happened. “Of course! The interior is an energy concentrator and the walls are so thin the torpedoes went through before detonating!”

She continued a moment later: “Ca’elia, I need you to get us in against the mirrors before they can finish charging again! If we don’t destroy the focusing mirrors we won’t be able to knock it out.” She hit the channel comm selector in her chair. “WC50 Lead, this is _Heermann_ Actual. Go for the capacitor banks behind that fusion bottle!”

The young Dilgar woman’s face shifted to a determined cast, gloved hands shifting on her controls as she spun the _Heermann_ about on her axis, queuing up pre-programmed evasive patterns to throw off the enemy fire that would soon be coming their way.

“WC50 Actual confirms! Going in on the attack.” The fighters and bombers of the strike package, with the armed runabouts anchoring behind, dove for the Solar Ray as the _Heermann_ radically manoeuvred under cloak to get into attack position on the focusing mirrors.

Goodenough took over the channel. “ _Heermann_ to WC50 Lead, warning, you have nineteen Mobile Suits identity code ‘Zaku II’ standing off the port quarter of that thrust block where they’ll be able to engage when you get in close.” Battle was joined.

  
  


For a moment it had seemed like they’d bought the farm. The _Huáscar_ heeled hard on her side, thirty degrees or more, without the straps in the control chairs every crewer on the bridge would have been thrown. Violeta gritted her teeth and kept the thrusters firing, her starboard broadside to the Solar Ray as their shields blocked as much of it as they could.

“Primary shields failed!” Fera’xero reported. “Captain, secondary generators failing too!”

“Reactors three and five SCRAMed automatically from overload!” Anna’s voice cut out of the intercom.

Suddenly Lieutenant Orallian’s chair at Ops lunged to the side as the adjustor mechanism failed under the pressure of the ship’s heel, and the Gersallian ops watchstander was tossed against a console, a groan abruptly cut off. Several of the ship’s officers spun toward him, but none could be spared.

“ _Steady on!”_ Zhen’var’s voice showed stress as she emphatically kept them focused on their duties, but no panic or worry as she was thrown hard into her restraints. “It shall pass!” She activated a commline to the nearest casualty clearing station. “Casualty on the bridge, corpsman!” Nobody could be spared for first aid, their first and only duty was to keep the ship alive and fighting.

“Secondary shield banks have failed,” Fera’xero reported, more calmly now, and even as he spoke more calmly, the ship herself seemed to calm. “The beam intensity is fading. Tertiary… Holding.” The force which had overcome the inertial dampers as the thrusters fought to compensate now faded and normal gravity restored to the ship.

“Prepare for imminent close-quarters-battle, our shields are degraded and they shall attack us with dispatch! See to your duties and prepare to engage incoming attackers! Status of the Federation forces?”

“We managed to put about half of the targeted fleet in our shield shadow, Captain, at least half their fleet and the _White Base_ are still intact,” Arterus reported.

“Captain,” Fera’xero interrupted calmly, but urgently, “the torpedoes--the Solar Ray--it’s firing again.”

Daria closed her eyes. Though it had been impossible to realise at the time she had fired, she now felt tremendously guilty. She might have gotten them all killed with those torpedoes, their own fire coming back on them. Then they snapped open, and picking the target of the Ray’s thrust block, she fired again. She could at least stop the weapon _now,_ perhaps, just perhaps…

“Sound collision and brace for impact.” Zhen’var’s voice still refused to show the panic or fear that even now battered frantically at her conscious mind - another blast like _that_ , when they had already lost so much of their shielding? They would be crippled in the best case.

The shot slammed into the _Huáscar_ and tore her to the side again. Violeta again compensated and held them in position, the ship heeling less severely than under the first attack. It seemed less powerful than before.

“Captain, it’s the energy from our own torpedoes detonating inside the plenum chamber! Because the mirrors are intact it was focused back at us,” Fera’xero explained even as the ship shuddered under the impacts.

“I’ve re-targeted against the engine so they at least can’t shift the aim-point,” Daria added. “But the chamber is so thin the torpedoes go through the walls and detonate inside.”

“We’ve lost shields, Captain,” Anna reported, a disembodied voice from Engineering, staying calm. “Minor hull breaches across decks three through fourteen. We’ve lost sensor input from PriFly.”

“Damage Control Central can deal with the matter. Alert the Marine and Security detachments to _stand-to_ to repel boarders _._ ” There was no need for the _bridge_ to be overwhelmed by the caphacony of alarms that the damage control teams were having to deal with. “Keep firing as long as you are capable, Tactical. Helm, with our shields down, manoeuvre to protect the ship as able.”

“Bringing us hard to starboard to present our portside armour. Guns,” Violeta addressed Daria, “I’ll keep the port arcs to the enemy.”

“Confirmed,” Daria repeated.

Arterus brought up the tactical plot. “Twenty-two mobile suits type “Rick Dom” coming in.”

“I expect they intend to disable then take the ship. It is our responsibility to prevent this at any hazard. Tactical, the mobile suits and the boarding teams following them should be the full effort of your weapons. We must trust our support ships to take the Solar Ray. Divine guide their efforts, for we must look to ourselves now.” Zhen’var spared only a fraction of a second for a glance to confirm that a Corpsman had arrived to treat Lieutenant Orallian. Satisfied she turned back to the tactical display.

“Targeting Rick Doms with Model 2 PBEs,” Daria confirmed.

“Bridge, this is PriFly Actual,” Stasia’s familiar voice cut over the intercom. “Our backup shield generator is re-activated and we are operational but depressurized. I am preparing to launch SP-5 and Major Aznable.” Not about to trust vacuum more than she did the waters of the Bering Sea, she had gotten her people into full suits regardless of Alliance standard practice several minutes after the main strike launch had been completed. It had saved their lives.

“Understood, PriFly. Deflector shields are down, we have Rick Doms, two squadrons, inbound. I am expecting boarding teams to be following. All you have, _Huáscar_ needs.” Her ship was badly hurt, hurt enough to make this a fight that had an outcome _deeply_ in doubt.

“Launching now, Captain,” her ready American accent answered, and the channel went silent.

Daria selected her targets, using a visualisation scope, and began to fire. Suddenly, the situation looked a little brighter. The Rick Doms tried to aggressively evade, but the _Huáscar’_ s port quarter erupted in flame and fire from the sweeping arcs of eight plasma beams stuttering toward their targets.

In the silence of space, the Rick Doms violently skewed and swerved to evade with the full potential of their Minovsky field generators, but limited to low-G accelerations, all the manoeuvrability in the world wasn’t _fast_ enough for Daria’s firing. The aggrieved Dorei woman had her moment of vindication as the beams stayed with their targets, and eight Rick Doms were instantly speared through, cut open, and left to explode.

Almost as soon as the first group had died, she brought the beams onto the next group. The Mk. 2 PBEs were more than powerful enough for the job. The attack was being ripped apart.

“There are fifty capital ships moving up behind them, Captain,” Arterus reported. “And I think.. Science, confirm it but in Sector 11-09X I think there’s another group of Mobile Suits, possibly covering boarding pods.”

“For what we are about to receive, let us be thankful. Helm, work with Tactical to keep us covered as best as possible while keeping her arcs, Tactical, you know your priorities, use everything Engineering can give you.” She was watching the displays as the repeaters showed her ship’s situation and made a quick estimate. “... We are going to run out of range between ourselves before they run out of ships.”

  
  


Lieutenant Ca’elia was deep in concentration, a three-dimensional globe display projected before her, ships indicated by lines coming from it, length indicating distance from the _Heerman._ It was not the normal display a helmswoman would use, being more intended for a tactical officer trying to keep track of a swirling series of contacts around, but she found it useful for keeping situational awareness - something she very much needed as she moved to thread the needle of the Zeon defensive belt around the converted colony cylinder.

“Stand by to transfer power to weapons,” Abebech directed behind her to Abdul.

Her expression did not shift, utter concentration written across her face as emerald eyes watched her display with total attention, fingers shifting deftly across her controls as she ‘slid’ them through the gaps, carefully conserving and bleeding velocity as she had to, bringing them ‘inside’ the arc of the three great mirror arrays, between two and with line of fire to the central glass cylinder, rigid with tension.

“Stand by…” Abebech raised her gloved right hand. “Range?”

Abdulmajid was staring into his targeting scope. “...Five kilometres, Captain.”

“Cannon-shot,” Goodenough muttered.

“ _Transfer power to weapons_!”

Ca’elia’s hands slowed their movement, drawing less power from the engines, knowing they would soon reduce in maximum thrust as the weapons arrays drew power from the ship’s pools. _May your God guide your shots, Abdulmajid._

“Allahueckbar,” he muttered under his breath as the cloaking device deactivated and he brought all the forward weapons into action simultaneously. A devastating wave of plasma cannon and phaser fire swept over the enemy while solar torpedoes swept from the launchers across the mirrors.

Behind the Solar Ray, Lar’shan’s fighters and bombers tore into the defending Zakus and the bombers swept over the fusion bottle, launching torpedoes at close range into the Minovsky charge capacitors located just inside the old colony atmospheric casing.

From two directions the fire converged on the guts of the Solar Ray. Covering his bombers, Lar’shan started to lure the Zakus away from the Colony, killing three in the process. It also kept him safe as the structure finally began to collapse.

A series of bright white-blue flashes erupted as the capacitors detonated, and rippling in a circle around the aft portion of the Solar Ray, Ca’elia was suddenly faced with a massive, detached, multi-kilometre long mirror fragment tumbling toward her ship in space.

Her eyes widened for a moment, but her hands were moving before her brain had even finished processing the situation, firing their side thrusters to start generating velocity… _yes_ , she had gauged the vector correctly, as the helmswoman spun her ship about and fired the engines as she did, demanding all the power the current power distribution would allow… it would be _tight_ , even so, and she called out; “Request tractors to repulsion, port quarter!”

“Do it,” she directed to tactical without missing a beat.

Mehmet needed nothing else from Abebech, his hands whipping over the board, setting the tractors, and kicking them on with almost exactly the effect and strength which Ca’elia had requested. The impact of the tractor beams with the object skewed them around sharply.

She had expected it, and used it along with their sublight engines to kick them the final distance clear, managing it by only a ship’s length from a protruding girder, swinging the bow back around with their main weapons facing the first waves of incoming Zeon craft.

“Leftenant, fire free,” Abebech ordered to Abdulmajid. “Major Lar’shan,” she next directed on the comms, “Form your wing on me.” Glancing to her right: “Goodenough, find us a way inside of A Bao A Qu. The Monster that guards the Tower is going down.”

She folded her hands for a moment. Stretched them, like a woman getting down to business. “Leftenant Ca’elia, full thrust! Close us to point-blank range with A Bao A Qu!”

“Aye, closing to point-blank, Captain.” The throttles went to the stops as her existence became the _ship_ , it becoming an extension of herself.

Abebech finally activated the comms on the Federation tactical frequencies as they roared ahead. Still not able through the intense jamming and energy surge of the heavy fire on the battlefield to be sure if the _Huáscar_ had survived, she resorted to making absolutely sure that she was going to obey Zhen’var’s final order. “All units of the Federal Navy! The Solar Ray has been destroyed! Close to point-blank range and commence the attack on A Bao a Qu! Gihren falls today!”

  
  


As Daria finished off the first wave of Rick Doms with the Mk.2 PBEs, Stasia completed the launch of the remaining squadron of fighters on the _Huáscar_ and Char Aznable’s Gelgoog.

Hearing the strain under the deckplates, Zhen’var grimaced internally. Her ship was being sluggish to answer the helm, some of the titanic energies aimed at the huge vessel had degraded her engines, and the situation was steadily looking worse. Even the Red Comet could not stand off a force _that_ large - he would run out of ammunition, if nothing else.

Not with weapons alone, though he might have given it a good effort. But he had another weapon. His voice.

“Comrades of Zeon! This is Char Aznable, who you chose to name the Red Comet! Today I come before you with my friends and allies in the Allied Systems, the spacefarers of a dozen galaxies, the realisation of my father’s dream! Yes, my father! I am Casval Rem Deikun, son of Zeon Zum Deikun, the founder of our nation! The murderous House of Zabi destroyed my father, murdered him, we have Degwin’s confession to his crimes. It was that confession, it was Degwin’s effort to surrender which caused Gihren to _murder_ him, and we have proof of that too! You are fighting for kinslayers, usurpers and genocidal tyrants!”

“The true vision of Zeon Zum Deikun is to be found when we go to the stars! Gihren promises you an endless cycle of murder and death over Earth. Stand against him, and travel with a comrade to the stars. The door is open, the void awaits. _Sieg Zeon!_ ”

As the declaration faded from the comm channels, Fera’xero spoke with swelling happiness in his voice. “Captain, I can confirm major structural damage to the Solar Ray. It appears to be breaking up. Commander Imra and Major Lar’shan got it, Ma’am.”

“It remains only to be seen how Major Deikun’s appeal is received, then.” She warily watched her tactical displays, as her ship stood to readiness once more, gathering her strength for the last desperate effort that would _hopefully_ never come.

“Captain, Engineering,” Anna’s voice came up. “I’ve got overrides for the baffles on impulse banks three, four, and six coming up. When they’re done in another three minutes, it’ll restore partial ability to manoeuvre. I’ll also regenerate Reactor No.3 in four minutes. Five longer. Nothing else to report.” There were hull breaches, casualties, probably fatalities, but the Captain only needed to know about what would impact the fighting of the ship, and so all of that fell by the wayside.

“Understood, thank you.” She _was_ grateful as she factored it in, checked the timing on the approaching craft. The Zabi loyalists _would_ be a problem, what of them there were. She could _not_ gauge the situation without seeing how the Zeon forces would split.

Lieutenant Tor’jar, trying to maintain the comms functionality throughout the ship, was diverted on his board to where an insistent sublight comm message was flashing, and took it. “Captain! The _White Base_ is hailing us.”

“On my panel.” She would not occupy the main screen while they were in combat, swinging her personal display into position from the arm attached to the side of her command chair. The rest of the bridge could hear the speaker, it would do.

“Captain Zhen’var, Captain Noa. I appear to be in command of the surviving Federal Navy forces and I’m acting accordingly. We received a directive to press the attack on A Bao a Qu. In light of Casval Deikun’s declaration I believe this is the right thing to do. He’s upheld his end of the bargain, we’ll push the attack home on Gihren and count on surrenders and defections. But we’ve detected one hundred and fifty-one mobile suits converging on your position from behind those advancing capital ships. They’re taking advantage of the position of our own fleet and the battle around us to sneak in toward you, Captain. If you can start advancing directly on A Bao A Qu, then our own advance will put us in a position where I can have the Gundam hit them on the flank when they reach point-blank range with you. Is that an acceptable battle-strategy?”

“It shall have to do, Captain Noa. Helm, you heard the plan. Shape our vector towards A Bao A Qu. Tactical, ensure our timing is correct.”

Ahead of them loomed the great base, made of two asteroids fused together around a heavily armoured fabricated steel strength girder. Defended by 20 defence battalions of mobile suits and ground-positioned troops and heavy weapons batteries, it was equipped with beam shields, but they were scarcely the panacea that a properly functioning Darglan shield was.

“Long range fire-free, Tactical… we may be able to spook their leadership if they think themselves personally in danger.”

“Understood, Captain.” Daria wasted no time in cueing up a full bore torpedo salvo that would impact with A Bao a Qu at high ballistic velocity even after fuel was exhausted.

“We have another reason, Captain,” Arterus reported. “Long range sensors show Naqia emissions near A Bao A Qu. I believe Commander Imra has moved on to a new target.”

“She as always, has her eyes on the prize. Restore what we can, and prepare to defend ourselves. In our state, the fight shall be even.” The more damage was repaired, the more _Huascar_ regained her ability to fight, to dominate her local battle-space, though the Solar Ray had done enough to require dockyard time, that Zhen’var could _feel_.

And then the open comm channel of the local Federation forces rang out with a panicked and inexperienced voice. “Here come the Zekes! _AAAGH!”_ Moments later, boiling like ants from the sun, they were under attack. Dozens of Balls started to explode as the lead wave ripped through them.

“Tactical, you are fire free!”

  
  


At A Bao A Qu, Abebech Imra had exploited first, by closing the range. Then, with a series of rapid and precise orders, she formulated and implemented her battle-plan, wrangling in the Federation Mobile Suits attacking Sector S. Wedging in between the fleet forces covering Sector E, which seemed to be hesitating after Char’s announcement, and those in Sector S, she had worked Lar’shan’s fighters into position to attack below the Beam Shields. Now it was up to Ca’elia’s work at the helm to keep them alive as their heavy forward batteries stitched up position after position on the surface of A Bao a Qu, and Commander Goodenough tried to localise the beam shield projector to be targeted by the remaining torpedoes on the bombers.

She barely moved, eyes slitted, hackles reflexively raised and demi-claws trying to work through her gloves, explosions of motion as she needed it, whipping their attacker around like a runabout, occasionally slamming people into restraints as she exceeded the inertial dampers ability to keep up to dodge especially vicious torrents of fire.

With the shields properly calibrated, they were effectively holding off the Minovsky beam weapons. It gave Abel Veeringen down in engineering on the _Heermann_ a thrill of pride at a job well done. Anna’s mods had worked, the damned Pole was a true engineer and more sympathetic to his views than most. With all systems running nominal and the shields’ main threat being the thermonukes Gihren’s forces were throwing at them, he had the _Heermann_ operating as a fine-tuned machine for Ca’elia’s manoeuvres.

Goodenough, locked into his chair, monitored the processing of the sensor data and ran algorithms, occasionally providing an audio warning to Imra of something he knew his Captain would find important enough to warrant it. They were moving at low speed but high manoeuvrability, operating in closely defined proximity to the immense asteroid base. His education may have been with Darglan Brainwave infusers, but he wasn’t a slouch with the sensors and analyzers now, even if he found the role odd for an XO.

Wave-forms and energy had to originate, and be transmitted, from somewhere. They couldn’t exist otherwise. They might form a bubble or a wall in space, but at some level there had to be a connection to the original source. As it was, the debris made the situation _easier_ to analyze. Perturbations in them indicated contact with energy fields. The computers pulled back the position of the projector from these data alone. It was going to have to be enough.

“Captain, probable location. Helm, you have it.”

Abebech looked at the arm-rest display and nodded once. “Good enough.” She cued her comm. “Major Lar’shan, we’ve got a location and Commander Goodenough is updating your wing now. Give it everything.”

Ca’elia was already moving to get _Heerman_ ’s weapons on target, slipping through the Zeon forces that continued to swarm all around.

“All right. Get us in, get the job done. We’ll open up a gap for the Federals to concentrate fire through as they close to contact. Weapons, full power charge ahead.”

 

 

As the _Huáscar_ moved in with the remnants of the Federal Navy, lamed but recovering, the assault force led by Kusko Al closed to contact. With only a small area of shields active on the port-side, she swung in with her massive Zeong to the starboard, coming in from aft. “Target the bay doors on those big hangars, if we can crack them open the assault troops can land directly. I’ll suppress the defensive fire.”

And what a tremendous quantity of defensive firepower it _was._ The Mk.2 and Mk.1 PBEs and the PIBs opened fire, raking across the incoming mobile suits, now at close range and with full force. Fifteen of them were destroyed within thirty seconds.

Kusko Al and the big Zeong wasn’t one of them. She cut across the hull of the _Huáscar,_ deployed her detached weapons and threading them around the fire to deliver pinpoint, precision converging fire directed by her _mind,_ direct interface with the deployed weapons pods. Energy beam after energy beam was sharply delivered, not wasted on the immense armour of the monstrous interstellar ship, but striking home to derange and destroy firing aperture after firing aperture. Behind her, groups of Zaku IIs and Rick Doms raced in to take advantage of the gap and target the bay doors of the ship.

And then a prominently red-coloured Gelgoog swung down in front of her as she looped under one of the _Huáscar_ ’s nacelles. “Kusko!” The unmistakable voice echoed sharply in the earbuds of her spacesuit. “This is our chance! A land for Newtypes! Why do you continue to fight for the Zabi?!”

She directed the weapons fire of the Zeong against Char’s Gelgoog as rage burned in her, the red suit evading but not firing back. “Char, you understand nothing of what they put us through at the Flanagan Institute! This was our chance to prove ourselves to Zeon, to those like Gihren who dismissed us. You’re ruining it by turning on our people! You’re fighting with the Federation! The oppressors of all Spacenoids!”

Suddenly a massive white mobile suit, utterly distinctive but still smaller than the Zeong, descended on her, firing its beam. A warning, a sense of the individual’s mind, cued her just in time, and she ripped the Zeong away from the fire just in time. Presented with an opportunity by her sudden evasion, she spun around and concentrated against the ramscoop on the lead part of one of the _Huáscar_ ’s nacelles before pirouetting the giant mobile suit back around to track on the Gundam.

“Look at you, Char! You’re not one of us who went through the institute, we all looked up to you but you never had to deal with our pain once, but here you are playing these games of power and revenge, like an Earthnoid. And now you’re fighting alongside the Gundam!” She pulled into another turn just as a burst of fire streaked along the course she would have taken.

  


 

“Captain,” Daria was reporting on the bridge of the _Huáscar._ “We’ve shot down eleven Zaku IIs and eighteen Rick Doms but they’re coming in another wave, still targeting the bay doors. We’ve lost thirty percent of our defensive aft firepower against small craft.”

“Both the Gundam and Char’s unit are being drawn away by the one big Zeon Mobile Suit,” Arterus added. “But the Federal Navy is almost untouched, we’re attracting the full forward firepower of the loyalist Zeon forces.”

“Thirty-eight Zeon ships have switched IFFs and their commanders are overwhelming us with requests for orders,” Leftenant Tor’jar supplied his own summary.

“Redirect requests based on proximity to either _Heermann_ or ourselves, what remains, Leftenant?”

“Could Commander Atreiad take over direction of friendly Zeon forces from secondary command?” Fera’xero asked.

It took Zhen’var only a moment to weigh the options “Agreed. Transfer incoming communications to him at once. Helm, use engine wash to assist in covering the bay doors. Tactical, keep up firing as long as we have emplacements aft, it is quite clear their objective. PriFly, evacuate your deck crews from the threatened area, Marines, if they get through, it shall be up to you.”

A chorus of acknowledgments sent the plans into action as the _Huáscar_ pulled ahead and to the starboard, _en echelon_ with the Federal Navy, leading in toward the swarming battle around A Bao a Qu. Around her, three Newtypes were locked in a deadly mobile suit combat that none wished to consummate.

  


 

Major Johnny Ridden drove his Gelgoog forward again and again through the teeth of heavy opposition. The pilot with his unicorn blazon was leading the Chimera Corps of Zeon aces deeper through the lines; the thirty-one pilots had already accounted for one hundred and eighty-five Federation mobile suits.

“Chimera Corps, form on my left wing.”

“ _Acknowledged,_ ” chorused the line. He flipped his Gelgoog casually and tore through a line of Balls with short-range before checking to dress ranks. Ahead of him was something entirely different from a Mobile Suit, and it wouldn’t be an easy capship kill, either.

The Newtype woman Kusko Al’s voice cut into his comm circuit. “Major Ridden, we’re commencing our final attack on the bay doors of the alien cruiser now. Get Chimera Corps in there and wreck it.”

“Copy and confirm,” Johnny answered. He seethed at taking orders from the much more junior Newtype, but the directive had come straight from Kycilia, and for his beau, the indignity would be tolerated. “Attacking now.”

The cluster of mobile suits swung around Federation ships to use them as cover for the final attack. One of the Gelgoogs spun in formation and opened fire, destroying a Federation cruiser.

“Lieutenant Diplom, cut it out! Save your ammo for the alien cruiser!”

“Acknowledged and con--” the channel abruptly cut off.

Ridden spared a look at his side visuals. A line of Gelgoogs in Chimera Corps had ceased to exist, seven elite pilots gone in a heartbeat, as the beams and pulses of the energy weapons on the enemy cruiser had gone through them like a knife through warm butter.

On instinct he kicked his thrusters to full and dropped down. A stuttering beam ripped through the space he had been in. _They’re massacring us,_ he thought, his gut clenching as the screams of his pilots echoed through comms. They were veteran killers, and they were used to reaving like Gods of War.

Now they were finally meeting their match. Ridden snapped his Gelgoog through another crisp manoeuvre, working his way closer as the fire of the alien cruiser reduced his corps to a pile of rubble. With each loss, he became more determined to see it through. Revenge was in front of him, and an end to the massacre.

Again and again the beams of the cruiser tried to finish his squadron, and the losses piled up, but Johnny Ridden led his dwindling team closer with each jink and evasive manoeuvre, carefully choosing his course to evade and advance. He was going to _get her,_ to get that damned devil-ship.

The gaping ruins of the hangar bay doors loomed in the aft dorsal surface of the ship. They were almost there. “Chimeras, call out!”

“Chaseman, here!”

“Ingrid, here!”

 _Three of us?_ For a moment shock almost stopped him from making the next evasive manoeuvre. _Have we really taken ninety percent casualties?_ But they had. “Kusko, this is Ridden, we’re going in. What’s left of us.”

He brought his thrusters to full power and aimed for the bay. Now the cruiser’s hull was masking her intact guns. Three would have to be enough.

  


 

Lar’shan led his fighters down in close to the surface of A Bao a Qu. Slipping between beam shields, the attrited wing of the _Huáscar_ dodged a line of last-ditch nuclear explosions fired by Zeon artillery pieces emplaced on the surface of the asteroid and followed the _Heermann_ in. Four Rick Doms dove on his squadron from positions higher up the inverted cone of A Bao a Qu as they did.

He peeled off his with his wingman to meet them. “Keep it tight and cover the bombers!” Skewing hard at low thrust so that his manoeuvring thrusters pivoted the Mongoose on the dime, he caught one with a first of forward fire. The others dove back for the surface of A Bao a Qu.

Cancelling his forward velocity, he used thrusters to flip the fighter over and track. It was exceptionally dangerous, the fact that he wasn’t a moving target made him immediately subject to a concentration of fire from the surface defensive battalions, but his wingman stitched along them in a short pass with the forward guns.

Lar’shan instead skewed the nose, tracking the surface, and unleashed his last two underwing missiles to track for heat sources along the surface while firing on one of the suits as it reappeared, silhouetted against the distant light of the Earth. It was torn apart instantly, and Lar’shan shoved his throttles to full power and the fighter roared ahead to fall in with the rest of the wing. He had no torpedoes as he evaded the fire from the surface, but he needed to be here anyway, diverting enemy anti-air from the bombers, making a dummy pass.

Suddenly, the assembly of buildings they were targeting loomed up on the surface of the asteroid. The bomber pilots and the _Heermann_ needed no more prompting. A massive concentrating of converging torpedo fire descended. The nuclear-scale explosions scoured the side of A Bao a Qu and left huge, spreading cracks in the rock. The station-keeping thrusters it had began to automatically fire to counteract the momentum imparted. Seeing one in his targeting sight, Lar’shan quickly fired on it and was rewarded with a massive blossom of fire from the surface close in the wake of the destruction of the beam shield projector.

The more important thing was that an entire sector was now uncovered by Beam Shields. The Federal Navy knew what to do. Instantly, the converging fire of twenty capital ships or more scoured the surface of A Bao a Qu as mobile suits dove in to spread out from the cone of death and destroy anything they found on the surface. This had abruptly gotten much too hot.

“All squadrons, WC50 Actual, break off! Pull back! We’ve done our job! Regroup around the ruins of the Solar Ray!”

  
  


“Captain, one of the defence sectors on A Bao A Qu just lost beam shielding,” Arterus reported. “We do have an engagement angle for the forward batteries.”

The last order that Zhen’var kept to herself, as the crew responded to the stressful situation around them, unlike any they had trained for.

“Tactical, give them everything we have left forward, empty the capacitors and magazines.” Her voice was still calm as she watched the tell-tales slowly flickering to amber or red as her command took more damage. It was not hopeless, not yet, their fire _was_ telling, but the outcome remained seriously in doubt.

Daria cued up the forward batteries and started firing the Mk.2 PPCs and Mk.1 PPCs on the forward arc, leaping across open space to strike A Bao a Qu within a fraction of a second. The Solar torpedoes began to follow them in.

Chief Carstairs, standing in at Ops at this point, flung a look to the Captain. “We’ve lost the doors on the main hangar, Ma’am. A group tried to exploit; three of them made it through our batteries. They’re coming in, Captain--we have mobile suits boarding the ship.”


	6. Act 6 and Tag

**Act Six**

 

Fei’nur had taken considerable measures to prepare the _Huáscar_ against boarding. Part of that was driven by Zhen’var’s paranoia after the coup in her own crew. The Marine complement was more heavily Dilgar, and under Fei’nur’s command, Zhen’var certainly had a subconscious tendency to regard them as utterly reliable. Fei’nur for her part had picked people who were, in fact, reliable. The Warmaster’s step-daughter was a bit strange, but orders were orders, and Fei’nur had rather started to regard her CO fondly; she did have good instincts.

For this operation, Fei’nur had prepared her defences with special attention to the risk of heavy firepower being brought into the ship. She had, after all, put considerable effort into reinforcing her troops to deal with _precisely_ that kind of threat.

Janice Armstrong as the Security Lead was coordinating the overall defences of the _Huáscar_ against any potential boarders, but it was the Dilgar Major Kel’dar with the Marines remaining aboard who had the heavy weapons closest to the hangar bays when Armstrong’s message echoed in his headpiece in his tactical suit. “All Hands Stand By To Repel Boarders. Enemy Mobile Suits entering the main hangar!”

“Confirmed. One company standing by, Major, redeploying Charlie to Company to respond,” Kel’dar answered. Colonel Fei’nur, who would inevitably know exactly what to do, was not here. This was not at all a problem, because she had left instructions in the event of an attack of this type by the Mobile suits. Instructions that were mildly nuts, but Kel’dar wasn’t about to question a Spectre. He had served one tour on Balos as a fourteen year old conscript before being sent back to a depot on Rohric with wounds. No way would he question a woman who had survived years there.

“I can’t believe we’re about to do this, Sir,” Lieutenant Har’un muttered, “but the charges are properly set and armed.”

“Battlemaster Fei’nur says we do it, we do it,” Kel’dar answered. “This ship is much more rugged than our’s and we’re in our suits.”

“The crew isn’t, Sir.”

“And I don’t know how that started -- but just because there’s mewling idiots or nobles getting their fur fluffed every day somewhere at top doesn’t mean we need to bone ourselves for the sake of a couple of morons not in vacsuits!”

“Sir.” Har’un, who had been born after the war on Tira, thought some of the crew of the _Huáscar_ would be really upset at that callousness, but they weren’t here to hear; the Major’s command staff was basically all Dilgar.

In the glorified arms-locker that served as his area command post, Kel’dar brought up an image of the massive suits now angling for the shattered doors of the hangar bay. “Inform Sergeant Waters’ detachment to stand ready.” He liked Sergeant Waters; she was one of the most reliable humans under his command.

“Sergeant Waters’ says Team Lion is powered up and waiting for orders,” Gunnery Sergeant Tir’ga answered a moment later. “She asks for clearance to detonate the charges.”

“Order her to stand by. We don’t want to give them a warning!” Then he switched to the Engineering code on his tacsuit. Fei’nur hadn’t asked, there hadn’t been time. There wasn’t really time now, either, but Kel’dar had learned something about covering your ass in Allliance service. “Major Kel’dar to Engineering - Is there anything critical in the starboard bulkhead of Cargo Hold Eight?”

Anna, standing in a torn vest and a rebreather in the midst of main engineering, who thought she was minutes away from restoring shields, got this expression on her face like she was personally aggrieved by the distraction, and pulled at her honey-blonde hair. She answered the comm with a _glorious_ level of frustration at a _damn marine_ asking her about a _bulkhead_ in the middle of a desperate fight to save the ship. “Major… _No_. Now shut up, I’m busy!”

The Dilgar major shrugged and switched the channel without a word. “Damage Control Central, stand by imminent internal explosion, Cargo Hold Eight.”

The Marines looked at each other. Sergeant Waters was sitting in the turret of the massive Nazi Lowe in full vacuum rig, now repainted in Alliance colours. “Up-shot!”

One of the Dilgar rankers rolled out of the way. “Charge ready, Sir!” Echoed through Kel’dar’s comm.

“Gelgoog in the bay! Gelgoog in the bay!” The warning echoed over Kel’dar’s suit com. “Blow it,” he said simply.

The sappers dashed to cover, having frantically set their breaching charges to bring down the structural frames. “ _Fire in the hole_!” One of them was still sliding behind the cargo containers when the signal flashed to the detonators, and a precisely timed chorus of explosions rippled across the bulkhead before the massive panzers.

The targeting sensors for the gunners resolved on the lead Gelgoog which had landed in the hangar bay and was still reacting to the abrupt explosions. “Take the shot!” Through the swirling air of partial decompression, with an enormous noise which could be heard throughout the entire ship, the three tanks fired in short succession.

These were no Earth Federation tanks with totally inadequate weapons. The main guns on the Nazi tanks were more than capable enough for what happened next. A Gelgoog’s left leg was blown off and the suit thrown violently into the far wall of the hangar. The second suit coming in behind it to help clear opposition for the boarders couldn’t pull back in time and met a similar fate, slammed into a tangled pile of debris in the main hangar, as even on the bridge the noise sounded more like they were an old dreadnought thundering main gun broadsides in the atmosphere than a proper starship.

A third suit halted on the edge of the bay and tracked down the holes in the bulkhead, opening fire with two beam rifles. It was a model none of them had seen before. The tanks were, based on the amount of bulkhead destroyed--the lower part of the bulkhead had been intentionally left intact--were essentially ‘hull down’, and the pilot confronted with the unusual scenario had tried to burn straight through the remainder of the blasted and rended bulkhead. His fire chewed through it, but failed to hit the tanks’ turrets.

Firing again and again, the guns of his suit quickly proved to have inadequate firepower to punch through the internal armoured bulkheads of the _Huáscar_ \--the Nazi cannon were designed to pierce immensely thick armour, the weapons of the Zeonic forces, conversely, to guarantee destruction of tin cans in space--they were very good at that and now inadequate for the task they were given _._ The suit activated its beam sabres instead and advanced.

Jess Waters certainly had a moment of sheer terror course through her. From a distance of less than a hundred meters, a charging Gelgoog with a glowing beam sword was rushing toward her and her three-tank section. She finished dialing in the gun on the charging form. “Guns, do we have charge?”

“Two seconds, Sarge!”

They would have been dead except for the need of the suit to surmount the barrier of the crushed, blasted, melted and rent bulkhead. She adjusted fire again to aim at the lower servos as she watched the suit move with the smoothness of a living being. “All tanks, on my sight, fire!”

A fresh burst of synchronized rounds dropped it to the deck with the others. One moment he had been ready to plunge them to death, to carry on his mission, and the next, the three shots tearing into the heart of the suit, it was sprawled across the sheared bulkhead, teams of Marines going in to secure it, the others, and the pilots. It was a moment of true bravery, but it had not advanced as fast as the Nazi guns recharged and tracked. Jess, with a tinge of reverent nervousness, patted the Zeiss sight and shook her head, tense and ready for the next attack.

Nothing else followed. They had stopped the suits cold. A moment later, working around the shock and the roars above her, Anna restored the full tertiary shield coverage for the _Huáscar,_ and the threat was permanently ended.

  


Kusko Al tore through another lightning series of manoeuvres, closely followed by Char. Repeatedly she bore in on the Gundam just to be driven off by the Red Comet’s furious manoeuvres. Then the Gundam would come about and try to pin her down again, and she’d divert her combat remotes to face it instead. Properly trained in their use as an Elmeth pilot, she was confident that Char could have _never_ equaled her on the Zeong. He had never been as powerful of a Newtype as anyone who had come out of the Flanagan Institute.

She was still totally defensive and she knew it, but the rage that suffused her from her days in the Flanagan Institute would broke no patience and no surrender. The steadily spiralling reports of major Zeon defections, fleets and squadrons declaring for Casval Rem Deikun, just drove her onwards.

“You are the new best pilot of Zeon,” Gihren’s voice echoed into her helmet. “Fighting the Red Comet and the Gundam at once you are our future. Hold your position and there _will_ be help coming.”

A part of her vaguely wondered by the leader of the people of Zeon, personally commanding the immense fortress of A Bao A Qu, didn’t have anything better to do but try and encourage her. She didn’t need it. Kusko could _feel_ both Char and Amuro, hesitating, still making appeals to her.

Then words of pure dread cut across the channel. “The interstellar ship, its beam fields have been re-activated!”

The despairing declaration from one of her surviving subordinate Mobile Suit pilots cratered her heart out. Major Ridden and the Chimera Corps had failed. They’d never be able to punch through them now. It brought her out of the total target fixation on her two rival Newtypes and led her to search for a solution to the desperate straits she was now in. Her command was going to be destroyed and Zeon was going to lose the war unless she stopped that massive ship that had conspired with Char to commit treason. And she needed the solution now.

Jinking clear of the Gundam and Char, she through her jets into a high burn and recalled her bit pods. Escaping from battle the thrusters still had plenty of power in a shock, sharp move to carry her clear as both of the rival suits moved to pursue, buying her seconds of freedom. It looked like she was going in the wrong direction to get anything done, though. Instead, she was looking for a way to save the battle.

She found one in a nearby Federation cruiser, repositioning itself to fire its main beam cannon on another sector of A Bao A Qu that had lost shielding. As it did, its bow arc was swinging toward the _Huáscar._ She dove on it and opened fire on the port thruster block with her mega particle cannon, casually dodging the defending fire of the desperate cruiser. Slicing it clean off the hull, she intentionally avoided a kill and then looped around the cruiser and swung herself back toward her enemies, splitting her bit pods up to engage with converging fire at both the Gundam and Char.

The crippled Federation ship was now spinning, uncontrolled, straight for the _Huáscar_ ’s shields. _We are not finished! Not. Yet!_

  
  


The bridge crew had barely stopped feeling good about the restoration of their shields. Daria had punched through another dozen Mobile Suits with the remaining light batteries. The boarding contingents were beating a hasty retreat. The battle seemed to be well-in-hand.

Then the Earth Federation Cruiser making its turn abruptly stopped and dog-legged back in on itself with partial thrust. That partial thrust was driving it straight toward them and their still-tenuous tertiary shielding.

Zhen’var saw it, and called out - “Incoming derelict! Emergency evasion! Tactical, target that cruiser, _do not fire unless I order!”_

The jury-rigged manoeuvring system Anna had supplied screamed as the vanes on the impulse engines countered the lack of starboard thrusters. Slowly the _Huáscar_ started to turn, but the hull of the tumbling Federal cruiser was coming in faster.

“Collision alarm!” It was going to hit, _Huáscar_ was sluggish, and her secondary systems like her tractors had been less important than shields and weapons. She had tried to wait for the last moment, and now it was here. “Tactical! Fi-”

 

As the _Huáscar_ ’s bridge crews and sensor operators watched the steadily looming cruiser a quarter of her own length, a shadow flashed across the hull. The _Heermann_ had arrived, slashing down from the Z-positive.

Abebech Imra’s ship targeted a group of Gelgoogs still showing standard Zeon IFFs as she dived, her lighter weapons tearing through seven of them in the space of seconds. A main battery burst vapourised a Rick Dom in her way, leaving so much disassociated plasma behind.

The Ethiopian woman sized up the situation from the bedrock of more experience than she cared to admit, and saw exactly what Zhen’var was about to do. “Transporters, commence emergency beam-outs from coordinates being supplied by Commander Goodenough, now!” She looked to Goodenough with a single nod.

He needed nothing else to send the coordinates of the cruiser and drop their shields, that immensely risky act in the middle of battle. As the shields went down on the _Heermann,_ the transporters immediately started working, and a moment later they had the range.

“Mehmet, tractors!”

“ _Brace yourself!”_ He activated the tractors and, at high-vee relative to the target, locked on to the cruiser. The shudder was followed by a terrible whiplash which sent the _Heermann_ ninety degrees over to starboard on her X axis too fast for the inertial dampers to compensate. The freshly rescued Federal personnel were bowled like tenpins and the bridge crew strained to keep their stations, but there was Commander Imra calmly hanging in her harness as if she had experienced the same a dozen times before.

The crippled cruiser lurched violently to the side and with her momentum cancelled, the massive bulk of the _Huáscar_ swept past with a few hundred metres to spare. Her light guns were pumping fire into a group of Gelgoogs coming on to port as her beam was cleared of the cruiser. The _Huáscar_ rapidly claimed four of them and the others pulled back and concentrated on the crippled cruiser rather than face the tremendous defensive firepower of the Alliance ship. The cruiser was not long for the world, but the beam-outs of the crew of the crippled ship continued until the last possible moment as the fire and explosions spread across her decks. Abebech stared intently at the tactical plot.

“Captain, shall we raise shields? The cruiser’s been destroyed!” The belowdecks of the _Heermann_ were packed with survivors in spacesuits, stumbling about bewildered. There hadn’t been enough time for the Federation forces to be briefed, after all.

“Negative,” Abebech answered. “Commander Goodenough, you have the conn. Maintain evasive manoeuvres. Defensive only.” A mega particle cannon hit the _Heermann_ hard enough to rip into the bare self-healing armour and Goodenough shot her a look.

“Captain? We are taking fires, Ma’am.”

She didn’t look up, but instead continued staring intently at the tactical plot. “I need to settle a situation quickly. I will be in main transporter control. Keep the shields down until I order otherwise.” With that, she unstrapped from her command chair, and strode purposefully below decks.

As Goodenough levered himself over to the command chair of the _Heermann,_ checking systems, a petty officer taking over his own console, Captain Zhen’var’s voice came through the ship to ship. The ship’s armour was wracked with blow after blow, status indicators lighting up. The _Heermann_ was not designed to take it like the _Huáscar_ had been.

“Thank you for the assist, Commander Imra. Status?”

“Captain Zhen’var, this is Commander Goodenough. Commander Imra went below, she has a plan for… Something, involving the transporter. I was ordered to keep shields down and maintain an evasive and defensive posture until otherwise directed.”

“Understood, Commander. Tactical, cover the _Heermann!_ Helm, keep our heavy launchers on that asteroid base as best you can!” As the immense _Huáscar_ obeyed and swung to cover the smaller ship, the desperate fire of the mobile suits abruptly slacked, and Goodenough knew it had happened only one way, many of the Zeon pilots had abruptly died under the accurate fire of the cruiser.

He spared a glance to the long-range tactical. A Bao a Qu had huge missing pieces. The converging beams were stitching through the asteroids with such intensity that parts were glowing as lava fields. The defensive fire had considerably slackened, and the thrusters were no longer successfully holding position, so that the massive station was slowly rotating. That, however, was also bringing new sectors with intact beam fields and defensive battalions into the battle against the _Huáscar,_ but it was now so heavily damaged that it scarcely had a dramatic effect. Even as the _Huáscar_ turned to cover them, every heavy weapon which could bear upon the great fortress was still firing.

Goodenough only spared a single look for it. This was a battle as severe as any he had been in against the Reich, and with its own unique and terrible qualities. Now he just had to keep the ship in one piece for his Commander for a few more minutes…

  


Kusko Al had lost two of her remote units and was limited to the main body cannon and those on the command head structure of the MSN-02. She was still holding on in the fight against Char and Amuro, but as the _Huáscar_ had cleared her last-ditch attempt to knock out the great starship’s shields, she could feel hope fade in herself, and confidence surge in the enemies around her. Self doubt gnawed: _How can I take the best of both sides? By myself?_

Aboard the _Heermann,_ Abebech calmly worked an interesting transporter problem. Using the transporters tactically was rarely done. It was very hard to get a lock on a rapidly manoeuvring target, from a rapidly manoeuvring target. Still, it was possible, if you could forsee the next moment in the path of an object… Or a person.

For a brief instant, Kusko Al felt the power around her, cold and confident, in a way that none of the Newtypes yet were. But before she could react to it, Abebech had her lock, and in the same heartbeat reached out and activated the transporter mechanism.

In a flash, the MSN-02 was flying straight and level. Amuro swung in with the beam cannon and fired. One more kill for the Gundam. But even as he did, he realised he had not taken the life he had prepared himself so brutally to take, that he could feel, even then, still alive.

Instead, the young woman from the Flanagan Institute materialised in the transporter room of the _Heermann._ Abebech had already punched open the intercom to the bridge. “Commander Goodenough, get the shields up and fall in with the _Huáscar_!”

“With pleasure, Sir!” He answered, losing himself for a moment to his Royal Navy days.

Kusko looked around the transporter room in shock, composing herself. She reached out with her power and tested herself against Abebech, but Newtypes had not been trained in _anything_ of the sort, even in the Flanagan Institute. There they had been trained to interface with technology and little else.

Anyway, Abebech had a solution for that. She slugged Kusko Al so hard that she broke the helmet to her spacesuit, her gloved hand acting like a heavyweight’s under a boxing glove, with no instinct to pull the blow. The young woman dropped like a rock.

Abebech looked down and shook her head. “You’ll thank me later,” she said, and then stuffed her into the equipment locker, sealed it shut, and jogged back to the bridge.

  
  


“Captain, the _Heermann_ has brought her shields up and is falling in to starboard to cover our damaged flank,” Arterus reported on the bridge of the _Huáscar._ Suddenly another great moment of tension in the battle faded.

“Six hundred and fifty forward torpedoes fired, Captain,” Daria added her own report. “Down to fifty left in the forward magazines.”

“Cease firing with torpedoes for now, take us in closer, Helm. Give Tactical better sensor resolution, we need to make our shots count. I want that base knocked out… and I want sensor coverage in case our quarry attempts to escape.”

Barely had the confirmations been verbally affirmed when a new voice demanded her attention.

“Captain, this is Engineering,” Anna’s familiar lightly accented tone wafted to her ears. “My EVA teams have completed enough thruster repairs that I’ve disabled the baffle restricted regime on the impulse drives. You have full impulse. We also have Warp Six, and half strength on secondary shields to reinforce the tertiaries.”

“Helm, you heard the woman, take us in, Tactical, _take down that station!”_

“Tactical,” Fera’xero said urgently, “I’ve completed an analysis of the station structure and I have three likely points for the CIC. All three could be within range of our cannon with a preparatory bombardment by torpedoes. Data at your console, now.”

“We barely have enough torpedoes left,” Daria murmured. “Helm, stand by for target one.” She flipped the data over to Violeta.

“Target one at… Zero-four-zero…. Stand by… You are in alignment, Tactical.”

“Firing torpedoes.” A ten torpedo spread swept across the remaining space between the _Huáscar_ and A Bao a Qu. A vast rippling series of thermonuclear grade explosions tore into the station. “PPCs… _Firing._ ” A huge secondary explosion erupted. “Good hits, good secondaries. Clear for second target, Helm.” She was sweating, desperate to make it count, to end this miserable fighting.

“...Zero-two-niner… You are in alignment, Tactical.”

“Firing.”

“Captain,” Lieutenant Tor’jar pitched his voice to cut through the noise of the bridge. “A Bao a Qu on the tactical frequency signalling their surrender!”

“Put them through! Keep an eye out for our quarry!” The Captain’s voice did not show any triumph or elation, just the same flat, calm tone she had through most of the battle.

Daria quietly reached over and activated the self-destruct transmission to the torpedoes before they reached the asteroid. If they had gone into it they would have certainly finished the total destruction of the base. The Captain had only reserved the order to take life, not to save it.

  


Gihren looked relaxed despite everything, calm under the crushing weight of acceleration. “We’ll have a second chance to get the interstellar ship when they pursue us to Axis,” he was explaining. “A force of ships was sent to recover the contents of the Flanagan Institute. With Newtypes and new Mobile Suits we’ll be able to ambush them when they move into the asteroid belt. Indeed, it may be easier, since they won’t have a federation fleet to help them.”

The ship they were on had already left A Bao a Qu well in advance of the surrender. Several entire fleets were falling back with them. The rest of the Zeon Space Forces had switched sides to support Char; there was little question that the majority of Zeon’s population was going to support the arrival of Casval Rem Deikun, the Red Comet.

Kycilia leaned back and shook her head. “Gihren, where there’s smoke there’s fire, and where there’s one, there’s twenty. We lost our chance. Such a great Alliance has more ships, and those ships will be coming. You lost your chance to become the Liberator of the Spacenoids by killing as many of them as you did of Earthnoids.”

Gihren’s eyes snapped into focus, glaring at Kycilia. But her pistol was already out, and the beam lanced out, scouring the far wall of the cabin as it drove straight through his skull. A look of perfect surprise formed on his lips before his brain ceased processing his thoughts. He had never been prepared for the abrupt changes these interstellar visitors had brought. He had never been prepared for the Newtypes. And in the end, he had never given Kycilia her due.

As his body slid back against the rear wall under the influence of thrust gravity, she holstered her pistol, mussed her hair, and slid back to unslip Gihren’s gun from its own holster. “That was for father.”

For a moment, she regarded her brother and she tried to think of any sympathy or pity, but it had been long gone. In fact, though she had invoked Degwin, she wasn’t really sure that was why as the curious detachment floated over her, comfortably. The only thing she could think of was little Garma, pushed into war and responsibility too soon, and taken from her. Now that Char had revealed himself as Casval, she had plenty of suspicions about that. Consumed with those thoughts, she remained quiet as she pulled herself by the grab-irons out of the cabin and forward toward the bridge.

“Commandant Gihren took his own life,” she said quietly as she arrived. “In shame that his murder of Prince Degwin led to nothing but defeat. Set a course to rendezvous with General Rimini’s fleet, we will need them for what comes next.”

  
  


Onboard the bridge of the _Zanzibar,_ Elia paced under the assistance of the steady thrust as they burned toward the outer system. Finally, she turned, and walked to the intercom. “Comrades, I’ve been transmitting everything we’ve picked up from A Bao a Qu directly to the intercoms for a reason. You’ve heard it for yourselves. The Red Comet, your commander, Major Aznable, is Casval Rem Deikun, the son and heir of the founder of Zeon. Truly our next leader. He has assumed the mantle of authority of the State, as a just response to the traitorous murder of Prince Degwin by his own son, during Gihren Zabi’s attempted usurpation of authority.”

“General Rimini’s forces are certainly aware of these developments, they have the same receiving gear we do. I am now going to issue orders in the name of Casval Rem Deikun to the fleet. If General Rimini does not acknowledge his authority, we will have a fight on our hands, and at the worst, we may be sorely outnumbered.”

“Stations.” She dragged herself to the command chair and strapped in as the alarms sounded. The crew obeyed her with alacrity. They were Char’s, and for them, the decision had been a simple one. Lalah Sune stood at the side of her command chair, expression intent on her face.

Fei’nur still had an expression on her face that could cut steel, braced against the command chair as the engines flared - for the first time, she ‘thought’ loudly. _< Just what are you planning, Commander El’sau?>_

Elia glanced toward her. < _Well, I’m going to force them to switch sides. I don’t want to get to wherever we’re headed, and it’s a long journey on a slow boat. > _

_< They are retreating to join our true targets. The Zabi think like the Supreme Warmaster, but without her skill. They fall back to fight, as long as there is any hope at all. They want to draw us to our own Balos.>_

< _Are you saying you think that General Rimini will **definitely** refuse my appeal?> _

_< He may. I do not know his measure or loyalties. There were fools who stood against her on Omelos, no matter the damage it dealt to the war effort.>_

_< Understood. We’ll be doing this anyway, then. Fei’nur… If you want to help, and I mean really help, could you go stand by the bridge windows… And open your mind to me?> _

  
  


_<... I do not like this idea, El’sau.>_ The last came across with a wry tone, as she moved to stand at the bridge windows, forcing her mind to calmness.

< _...I respect that. But I wear our uniform for a reason, and that will never change. Please, sight General Rimini’s bridge with your enhanced optics, and keep it in focus. > _

She could feel a flash of realisation, as Fei’nur braced herself, cybernetic eyes stabilizing on the ship visible in their formation, and then disconcertingly closely zoomed on the bridge of the Zeon flagship.

“Comrades of Zeon, this is Commander Saumarez of Casval Rem Deikun’s flagship, the _Zanzibar._ We are loyal to Casval, Char Aznable, the Red Comet! The son of our founder and the visionary of our nation!” Elia’s voice cut through the void on the speakers of dozens of ships. “One of our great opportunities is to be a home for the evolution of humanity, exactly as Zeon Zum Deikun foretold in the Contolist Philosophy. That evolution has happened around us, with the manifestation of the Newtypes. It is nothing to be afraid of--it is the evolution of our shared future, which will make Zeon great and glorious in the future.”

“In Casval Rem Deikun, the future of the spacenoids will be realised. The murderous treasons which characterised the House of Zabi will end, and with them, the abuse of our fellow Spacenoids in other sides who we tyrannized under the false motives of the House of Zabi, when they should have been our comrades, our brothers and sisters whom we fought to liberate, not to destroy.”

“It was this error which led to pain and bloodshed in the One Year War instead of glorious victory. Now, as we work with Casval Rem Deikun to make sense of the pain, to rebuild, and to give a future to our descendants, the hour is at hand to make our choice. Do we follow the House of Deikun, the light which showed the way, or do we remain mired in darkness and defeat? _Zanzibar_ will stand for the light, and against the darkness. If you wish to stand against us, remember that you also stand against the Red Comet!”

As she spoke, her mind came gently in touch with Fei’nur. The two were very dissimilar people. El’sau was an aristocrat, from an old military family, who had endured great hardships from being in the Corps, but had done with every resource she had needed to prosper. Fei’nur had known the typical life of a Dilgar of Ogkharin, a working class girl who had carefully hidden the ways she was not quite normal from family and friends, to fit into the regime’s expectations for what she should be.

Together, though, they shared a stubborn loyalty that few could match. And in Elia, that loyalty was now forever encompassing of the Mha’dorn, the Dilgar telepaths, as much as her own people. She was a woman between two worlds, in some respect half Dilgar and half human. Tira had changed her forever, and her words had been honest. There was no going back. Lalah knew the truth of it, as she reached out and had her training firsthand through Elia’s mind.

Together, linked, Fei’nur could feel El’sau see through her eyes. She reached in and focus on General Rimini’s bridge crew. The man had been handpicked to evacuate to Axis. Elia couldn’t directly see him, but she could feel the other members of the crew. Brushing aside the immorality of what she was about to do, she reached into the mind of one of the bridge officers through Fei’nur.

Her cybernetics activated, keeping her emotions calm, avoiding any spikes that could throw off a Mha’dorn using her as a bridge link. She was not a telepath, she never would be - but the Mha’dorn had always been an integral part of the Imperium’s war machine, and the Spectres had trained with - and against - them. Her mind relaxed as chemicals diffused into her bloodstream, letting as much of the telepath’s effort through her as she could.

She peeled away layers of the distant man’s mind, un-used to the idea of blocking, and dove in deep, grabbing control of his musculature, his movements. He slipped the gun from its holster, and she took his words. “Long Live Casval Rem Deikun! Avenge Zeon Zum Deikun! _Sieg Zeon_!”

The gun fired at General Rimini. The intensity of what they were doing, the cruel necessity, made the young Hyderabadi ensign tense at her side, but in it, too, her heartfelt love and loyalty for Char carried her on. This was the sausage-making of nations, as unpleasant as it was necessary.

As tenderly as she could, Elia withdrew from Fei’nur’s mind, respectful of the woman’s discomfort, of her privacy. Around her, the crew of the _Zanzibar_ began to report ship after ship, proclaiming for Casval. The flagship was silent in the chaos she had caused.

  
  
  
  


The Federal Navy lay off A Bao a Qu with the _Huáscar,_ in the general jubilation of a truce a few hours later. The formal peace talks between Casval and the Federation leadership would commence on the _Huáscar_ in three days, assuming the Alliance didn’t countermand them.

Abebech stalked through the corridors of A Bao a Qu with a scanner and a squad of Marines. They’d had to engage a couple of Gihren loyalist holdouts, but for the most part all the Zeon troops were claiming loyalty to Char/Casval and being helpful. It was a group of them who finally led her here.

She paused and looked, intently, through her sunglasses at the scene in the room. It was a production line, and unfinished on it were three MSN-02 units with Psycommu fittings and the necessary manufacturing elements.

For a moment Abebech was very lost. And then she started softly humming a line of verse:

“ _To defend_  
This is the pact  
But when life's scorned  
And damage done  
To avenge  
This is the pact.”

“All right, start setting the charges,” she ordered the Marines. Her mind was still aflame with distant memories of ships on fire across the rings of Saturn and a dozen other worlds, of seas of lava where people had lived. Of the keening scream in her mind of a Condor, offering both hope and death in the same hand.

She turned and stepped out of the assembly hall, then activated her omnitool. “Captain Zhen’var, I’ll be aboard the _Huáscar_ to report in approximately fifteen minutes. One site to fire, no risk to the installation.”

“Understood, Commander. Well done, I assume. I look forward to hearing it.” There was a pleased undercurrent to the woman’s voice - she still held local command, on her badly battered ship.

“Thank you, Captain. I think you will yet find yourself remembered as a friend to Espers as well as a true Dilgar. Thank you for trusting me.”

  
  


“You are welcome. I await your report.” The comms unit clicked off, as Zhen’var leaned back in her ready room’s chair, the _piles_ of paperwork that awaited any commander after a battle ignored as she stared at the bulkhead. The casualty report lay upon it, and her Surgeon-Commander was working to stop it from growing. It would remain to be seen if her commanders _supported_ her initiative, or rebuked her for it, her runabouts still supporting rescue efforts in shattered mobile suits and capital ships in the massive debris field that remained of the battle.

The Ready Room door trilled. The computer, ever-too-helpful, announced the person at the door. “Lieutenant Arterus tr’Rllaillieu.”

Exhausted eyes looked up with a momentary flicker of confusion, which faded as she straightened her uniform and sat up. “Enter, Lieutenant.”

The Rihannsu man stepped in and saluted. He looked exhausted, but proud. “Captain. We’ve received a radio message from the _Zanzibar._ Commander Saumarez has secured the loyalty of a Zeon fleet that was evacuating to a base in the Asteroid Belt called ‘Axis’.”

“The base itself?” She had an interesting expression on her face - Zeon had not _totally_ acknowledged Casval - a situation that left her in a somewhat _delicate_ moment until reinforcements arrived.

“It’s in the asteroid belt, which is a half-month’s voyage for the local ships to conserve fuel,” Arterus answered. “Probably best to leave it until reinforcements arrive, if I may tender my advice, Captain.”

“I am not keen to have the Marines firing heavy ordinance _inside_ the ship again, that is agreed. Continue to monitor the situation, please. We do not have the remaining war criminals in custody as yet.”

“Understood, Captain.” He came to attention. “It was an honour to see action under your command, Captain. The Elements permitted us to live the fate of a _Huáscar._ Apparently, the Surgeon-Commander has the pilots of two mobile suits that boarded us as POWs in sickbay. Luckier heirs of Captain Prat, Ma’am.” As a cultured Rihannsu, Arterus had made sure to fully study the history of the name of his ship.

“If we confirm them as being not implicated of war crimes, I look forward to arranging their repatriation. _Heermann_ has transferred theirs aboard as well, I understand?”

“Those they recovered, Captain. There were just two. The rest of those they saved were Federation officers and men.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant.” She checked her omni-tool. _Enough time to seek a parole from them before Imra arrives, barely. I’ll meet her at the transporter._

  


For a few tense hours, Elia Saumarez had in fact found herself the commander of a fleet, like her illustrious ancestors. Fei’nur’s speculation had disabused her of the notion that their mission was over. Instead, she kept them at enhanced readiness, and waited.

Completing her reports within her sea cabin, she felt the touch of Lalah’s mind, the warning. < _A Zeon Vessel from B Sector of the A Bao a Qu defence forces approaching >, _she flashed.

Elia got to her feed and worked her way out onto the bridge, reaching out to gently put a hand on Lalah’s shoulder. < _You may not want war, but you’re a good officer. > _

_< I’m a good officer because Char needs me to be,> _she answered, < _but I understand more of the motivations of war than I thought I did, now. > _

< _Unfortunately, humanity is so very good at finding those. > _

_< Is it not forever so?> _Lalah answered.

 Elia strapped herself into the command chair again. She didn’t answer because it was true, and it didn’t bear endlessly reprising that truth.

Fei’nur was _tense_ , and she barely restrained herself from pacing as her hand clamped onto the side of Elia’s chair. Anything approaching from A Bao A Qu was _not_ good news.

“Do we have an identity on the incoming ships?”

“No, Commander Saumarez,” the lead comms tech answered. “They might be random ships that escaped the battle, but I don’t know why they’d be on a heading for Axis…”

And then the comm activated, on tight-beam transmission from the incoming ships to minimise the bleedback into the Earthsphere.

“General Rimini, General Rimini, this is Minister of the Interior Kycilia Zabi. We are joining your fleet in the retreat to Axis. Please provide us with an approach vector and burn schedule for synchronising our approach.”

When Fei’nur spoke, it was in Dilgar; “ _I suggest leading a boarding attack if we intend to take her alive, Commander.”_ <Or dead, it has been a long while since I removed such a high value target.> bled through from her thoughts, the commando’s posture betraying her eagerness.

“Answer through the flagship,” Elia ordered. “‘ _This is Commander Saumarez, Officer of the Watch for General Rimini. Stand by for your transmission.”_ She paused. “Then send them the necessary vectors.” A glance to Fei’nur. “Battlemaster, you rank me. Prepare your Marines at your discretion. You have your boarding action.”

Fei’nur gave a single nod, and started immediately transmitting from her sub-vocal implant. A boarding action of an enemy flagship? She had _always_ wanted to try that.

Once Kycilia’s loyalists had shifted into position, Elia sent the next message, which was a simple request for General Rimini to have permission to transfer over by shuttle and make his report on the status of the 116th Assault Fleet in person. When it was accepted, she nodded sharply to Fei’nur. “Want us to go with you?” She asked, gesturing to herself and Lalah. “You can say no. Ma’am.”

“If you wish, you may. I can remove her myself. It is… what I was made for, after all. Getting _out_ was often an ill-defined part of the plan, however.”

“We should try to take her into custody, Battlemaster,” Lalah said abruptly, stepping in to join the conversation boldly. “I know Char wants her gone, but it would be good to put a Zabi on trial.”

“Difficult, but a worthy challenge. If so, I very much want you both. I can incapacitate her, quickly, but I will need coverage exfiltrating with her dead-weight, Battle Expert. Draw weapons and gear, we need to move quickly before she grows impatient.”

  
  


The two women were in Zeon combat gear with a squad of Zeon volunteers. Unlike before, the crew of the _Zanzibar_ was now unambiguously reliable. The ship Kycilia had escaped on loomed before them as they approached the docking bay, matching _vee_ and then coming in on final approach.

“All I need is enough time to get there, then enough distraction to escape. Good luck, Battle Expert.” Before their eyes, she faded away, and disconcertingly, the feel of her mind faded as well, to a vague sense, even when they knew she was standing _right there_.

“I’ll never get used to that,” Elia muttered softly. She nodded to Lalah. “Stand ready…”

The younger, shorter woman took a breath, nodded back. < _Ready. >_

The hatch swung down. Dressed in Zeon uniforms the two floated down the ramp. They had to act immediately, since Kycilia likely knew who Lalah was. Ahead of them was the glassed in control position for the bay, and Elia reached out, gripping into the mind of the operator, peeling back the layers of any untrained resistance and seizing his upper body as she locked the rest in place. Immediately, she directed his muscles in the form and function necessary to deactivate the security cameras.

Lalah reached out, following her lead, and worked into the minds of the welcoming party. She slowed their reaction time to the strange approach as Elia completed the first step of her attack The moment Elia had finished securing the visual alarm systems, she turned her attention, mind joined with Lalah, and rapidly immobilized the full complement in the bay.

One of the doors cycled open - that would be Fei’nur, as the Marines came charging down the ramp at the first signal, thrusters firing softly as they moved - weapons cycled as fast as they could, stunning them as per their commander’s orders, who knew from hearsay the effects of being in someone’s mind when they died.

It was something that Elia desperately wanted to avoid, and especially for Lalah. There was a sense of relief as they drew back and let the men and women in the bay collapse from the stun-fire. < _It’s all right. They’ll be fine. >_

 _< I still want this to be over,>  _she answered. < _Is this the last act of this terrible war? Truly? >_

_< With you at Char’s side, yes, I think it might just be.> _

With a tight, but content smile, Lalah advanced to the forward positions with the Dilgar marines, Elia covering her. Now, they just had to hold for Fei’nur…

The whole point, of course, was to avoid detection until the moment was at hand. Nothing happened until Fei’nur reached the command suite within which Kycilia was waiting. Her red hair cut in the same length and style and her cool and composed expression in her ornate uniform made her something of a human, distorted mirror of Jha’dur. The mask accentuated the effect by hiding more of what was unambiguously human.

For a melancholy moment, the last Spectre paused. What was would never be again, even if she some day found where her Warmaster had gone. It _could not be_. It had ended, just as _this_ must. The old days were lost in ash and dust. Only Shai’jhur remained.

She raised her weapon and fired at the guards first, on stun. They toppled, and Kycilia whipped around to face the empty space in the command bridge. It was too much of a shock, too much outside of their technological schema.

Kycilia opened her mouth, but before she could form a word, the next wide-beam stun shot dropped her. Moving rapidly, Fei’nur turned to suppress the rest of the bridge, firing as she ran, essentially in a circle around the open space available to her to leave their shots in return going wide.

Five more seconds on, and the crew in her sights was unconscious. She turned to Kycilia’s prone form and flung her over the chameleon net. Oh, now she was visible in the sense that a collapsed woman ‘floating’ down the deck was blatantly obvious, but hitting her without riddling their commander with fire in the process when _Fei’nur_ still couldn’t be seen was an almost impossible challenge, and gave her the good chance to she had to make good her escape.

She kicked off, internal gyros keeping her oriented as she swung around corridors, back towards the hangar bay she had first landed within and the rest of her team. The alarms would be sounding as she moved, quick as she was able. _Time_ mattered now, eventually they would throw enough desperate sorts before the commando to slow her down and get real sharpshooters in place.

Crewers were knocked out of the way, sent flying and in a few cases stabbed. There was no mercy, no slowing down. The extremely low gravity meant her speed was incredible with her cybernetic assisted muscles and internal gyroscopic stabilisation to keep her from losing her balance. Any issues the load of an unconscious human would have given her in full gravity were most assuredly not present.

She swung down through a hatch coaming, knocking two crewers out of the way who had been traveling up, responding to the alert. A beam of fire creased past her, but her knife settled the matter a moment later.

Next Fei’nur lunged down another deck, this time to find a crossfire sweeping through the space she descended. She dropped low, letting Kycilia’s body shield her. The curses of the crewers told her the effect it had, and she quickly returned fire, stunning those in one direction before wriggling forward in the other.

Then, abruptly, the fire slacked off entirely. < _Go, Fei’nur! > _Lalah Sune stood there, eyes flaring as the men were locked in place, at the end of the corridor.

Fei’nur pulled herself to her feet and slung her load back over her shoulder, taking off down the corridor. She was clear a moment later.

El’sau was coming up as she did, a grin on her face. “Battlemaster. Since we weren’t doing anything else, we decided to advance.”

“Well done, Battle Expert, but we have overstayed our welcome!” She wavered back into view as she spoke. “Fall back to the shuttle, we need to get clear before they make foolish decisions!”

Lalah stunned the men she’d immobilised with the Alliance weapon Elia had given her.

“Fall back, raid complete!” Elia shouted crisply. The Dilgar Marines covered them, falling back by the half-squad down the major corridors they’d occupied.

Fei’nur would hand off the unconscious Zabi to two of her Marines to concentrate on overseeing the withdrawal - the last one up the ramp, as she preferred, calling out as she threw herself for the ramp “ _Go,_ all aboard!”

With anyone who came close enough to face Elia or Lalah at once halted in place, they had suffered no further casualties, and as Fei’nur climbed the ramp, Elia pulled her in. The moment it was secured, the pilot hit the manoeuvring jets to blow free from the bay, backing clear of the cruiser.

As they did, the _Zanzibar_ swung to face her, her beam gun ports charged. “ _Broadcast your surrender or we will open fire in the name of the Red Comet,”_ they ordered Kycilia’s ship. The game was over--the _war_ was over. For a few billion people, it had never been a game.

  
  


The next day, Zhen’var called her staff together for the hotwash. She would have done it the night before, but they still hadn’t recovered Fei’nur and Elia and everyone was tremendously exhausted. The conference room was still a pile of rumpled uniforms, even _Abebech_ looked like she’d slept in her’s, only Elia was perfectly made up. There was enough steam coming off the hot coffee and tea to make the glass of the table fog.

Three cruisers and a destroyer had joined them, too late for the fighting. Recovery operations had continued long into the night. The only noteworthy absence was Nah’dur, who had simply not shown up. “Captain,” Elia began, “The Surgeon-Commander’s apologies, but she has a backlog of life-saving critical emergency surgeries she’s still working through.”

“Mm. I shall not pull her away, after she finishes and has time to rest, we will have a smaller meeting with her. I will say to you all, very well done. We have achieved our goals, and we are still alive after having done so, if in need of dockyard time.”

“A week,” Anna sniffed. “There is much to go over, but, Captain, the most important lesson is that we were less damaged than we thought we were. The armour was penetrated only in six places, and each was with relatively minor consequences, contained by internal bulkheads. The problem was that the diffuse but high-power beam mission-killed a lot of our capabilities due to the concentrated damage on the starboard side.”

“The baffles, for example,” Violeta explained, “are intended to redirect thrust for manoeuvring. They’re massively armoured and controlled by mechanical linkages so it should be impossible to knock them out without repeated direct hits, but the sustained exposure to the beams weakened the material so that they bent and ultimately jammed. We could have had full power manoeuvring back faster if we’d realised the problem and replaced parts by feeding them out through the slats in the armour. It would have required depressurizing subsection XR-8 and opening access panels to get at the electrohydraulic actuator mountings, but we have could have done it.”

Anna nodded, and then gestured respectfully to Rick. “In the end it was the EVA teams which put us back in business, we assembled spare thruster blocks and started welding them to the starboard hull with flexible pass-thrus for the plasma once the restoration of shields made it possible for EVA teams to survive externally.”

“Awwh, shucks, ma’am, just doin’ our jobs…”

“The designers do not appear to have thought about what happens after the shields go _down_ , in terms of damage effects, do they? Systems failures and damage, I mean to say. We had multiple system failures from the beams, and extensive damage from precise fire to exposed emplacements and equipment, correct?”

“Correct,” Will replied. “The self-healing armour did its job extremely well, the problem was the hardening of apertures against this kind of exposure to sustained energy at temperatures and power well in excess of what would be experienced in the outer layers of a typical system primary.”

Zhen’var frowned. “During the Reich War, most vessels that lost shields did not survive the experience, did they? Survivorship bias, do you think?” Her expression showed she was deep in thought, occasionally tapping notes into the tablet before her.

“Also, Reich weapons were optimized to penetrate deeply and gut internal systems,” Abebech spoke, barely more than a murmur, but authoritative nonetheless. “The Solar Ray produced an effect analogous to attempting to directly enter a Star, so it was broad-based across the entire hull. I expect that the designers simply considered redundancy to be sufficient and didn’t attempt to consider a scenario where every single one of a piece of equipment on one beam was knocked out simultaneously.”

“Suggestions for alternatives? Earthforce had similar concerns, if weapons and sensor emplacements could be taken out on a beam, the fighter complement was supposed to prevent it.”

“We could use fighters and drones to compensate for weapons and sensors, particularly when the fighters aren’t detached like they were in that action,” Lar’shan was both assiduous and modest in his tone for the assessment, at times very unlike a fighter pilot. “However, that would hardly help with the thrusters.”

“No, you’re right, Major,” Arterus found himself thinking, and thinking hard, for the sake of his commander and ship. _Innovating,_ as Grandmother had done. And eager to make a contribution. “But if the _Heermann_ were available she could lean in on the damaged side with tractors, we could establish links and use her to compensate in manoeuvring.”

“If it could be completely autonomous, both computers could be configured to handle that,” Violeta said, her eyes glinting. “In controls-theory terms they’d be one spaceship at that point. It has its own risks, of course.”

“Speaking of,” Fera’xero added, “I _think_ we could have generated a bubble of similar size to protect the Federal Navy by stretching the shields with emissions from the warp coils, while keeping our bow-on to the weapon. That would have considerably mitigated the damage. I can have simulations completed in five days, and we’ll send them forward to operations. We’ve already sent the shield modifications forward, since they’ll be useful against the Dominion.”

“Excellent. Moving on to personnel operations…”

  
  
  
  


The next day in the morning, Zhen’var finally went to see Nah’dur. The woman had only just finished a surgery, gods knew how long she had been up, but she still seemed alert as she was going over some notes on her computer screen in her office. “Captain,” she greeted, covering her mouth as she yawned widely. “I’m prepping for the next surgery, but I have a few minutes.”

“I will not keep you long, then,” Zhen’var replied, and gently put a hand on Nah’dur’s shoulder. “How is it going?”

“Oh, it’s fine. I haven’t lost anyone yet. Six fatalities, all in starfighters destroyed outright. I’ve revived eight people recovered from space,” she had this almost insouciant look as she gestured at her screen, pointing to nothing in particular, “with wounds serious enough to puncture spacesuits. Three of our’s, three Federation, two Zeon. The longest was in a vacuum for fourteen hours.”

Nah’dur closed her eyes, from tiredness, not any emotional trouble. She gripped a mug of _Khyla,_ a beverage comprised of a stimulant tea cut with meat broth, and carried on. “So, the worst I had on the _Huáscar_ with two decapitations--total--and what I did this morning bright and fresh after waking up was the second of those. The longest was exposed to vacuum for three hours and atmosphere to four. Also a total of twelve other flatline cases have been revived, mostly by the other surgeons. There’s only two more of those which I’ll do personally before I finish, and I don’t really anticipate any problems with them. I’ve had six hours of sleep in the past sixty, but with stimulants that’s been enough to keep my work up.”

With her slightly-longer-than-bob auburn hair and intense expression, she was definitely calling to mind a certain woman Zhen’var had met before. Her look by that point was almost bored, though her voice inflected a certain degree of contempt as she continued into a rant, even if her words stayed polite.

“You know, Sister-Zhen, Alliance medicine has some real issues right now. Natural, expected ones. The ability of our Doctors and Surgeons to take up new skills is being taxed by the sheer quantity and scale of integration of twenty or so highly advanced medical technology schema, _all of which are different_ and _all of which_ have specific advantages. I’ve been using _all twenty,_ replicating lots of cybernetics for bypasses based on designs from Solaris, medigel and dermal generators, targeted chemical therapies for damaged tissue, protective plastics--so of course my surgical department has saved at least seventeen who would otherwise be dead--take note of that! Our fatality rate would be twenty-three if we were another ship. But instead, it’s six. If brain tissue is heavily damaged in one area due to oxygen deprivation? Image it to record as much of the data, program it into cybernetics and put it in place of the damaged tissue. You should generally recover enough of the personality to allow some kind of recovery. The only problem I’m fighting right now is medical ethics boards, but if I look hard enough it’s been approved by one _somewhere._ ”

She waved airily. “Anyway, it’s not really the fault of other Doctors, despite my feeling rather indignant about it. And that’s because it’s quite hard to properly integrate these different medical technology schema. So people are dying unnecessarily. There. That’s my -- what is the human military term?”

“Hot wash,” Zhen’var answered, mildly dazed. Not like she hadn’t expected this from Nah’dur, but it was still incredible to hear her talking, half-asleep, about casually running through so many different technologies and synthesizing them into specific medical strategies.

“Very well then. Hot Wash,” Nah’dur repeated, shaking her head. “Odd term. At any rate. I will disseminate as widely as possible, this was my first major battle so it was my first attempt to put some of this to the test, but unless concerted action is taken at high levels to require this kind of inter-universal training in schema for all combat doctors in the service, more will die. It’s as simple as that. Now, I have my plan,” she had quietly gone back to multitasking on her computer, “and I would ask you to leave, so I may finish up and finally have some rest.”

  


The next day, before they departed for drydock, a visitor came, quiet and composed. She beamed aboard after requesting to speak to Zhen’var personally. Arriving at her ready room, her eyes still hung with bags, the woman looked mature beyond her years after surviving the events of the past days. She, too, had fought at A Bao a Qu, and for a year before that as well.

Unlike the other Federation personnel, revelling in the end of the war, the peace, the capture of Kycilia Zabi, she had lost any opportunity for pleasure or even peace in the conflict. Artesia Som Deikun, better known to all of her friends and frankly to herself as Sayla de Mas, stepped quietly into her ready room, wearing civilian clothes.

“Good afternoon, Lady Artesia. What may I do for you?”

“Captain… Please, there’s no need for a title,” she answered after a moment, almost taken aback. “I wanted to talk to you about my future. Someone unbiased and willing to look at the situation as honestly as possible.”

“Then please sit. Mint tea, I believe it was?” Zhen’var rose herself, to walk to the replicator and get herself a new mug of chai.

“Yes, please,” Artesia answered, her eyes flickering with warmth.

The Dilgar woman handed her the mug, then moved back to her chair. “If you are asking this, you are implying you do not intend to stay with your brother, then, or that you do not wish to do so. Please, speak your mind.”

“I love my brother immensely, but I have spent the year fighting against his comrades, against the nation of Zeon, even if it was for the sake of right, that is still something that cannot be undone. It would be easier for him if he did not have to explain me, and easier for me not to deal with the eyes and thoughts which come from having served in the Federation in the war against them, sometimes actively as a pilot,” Artesia replied. She didn’t sigh, but one could almost feel it in the air. “Nobody can un-do the past year, Captain.”

“Nor should one have to. It sounds as if you are trying to find a _place_ in exile for some years, until passions cool and amity can be again found in this system. Is that so?” A stylus flicked between her hands, as Zhen’var pondered the point. “What do you _wish_ to do?”

“I want to be myself,” Artesia shook her head. “Of course, I scarcely know who that is. Well, I was never given a chance to prove myself as a pilot on the _White Base._ I ended up serving as one, but… Yes, I suppose that’s what I’m coming here for. I’d like to go with you, and see humanity in the stars in a dozen-dozen universes.”

“Wonders and horrors alike… from what I have seen of you, I would sponsor your application to join our service as an officer, if you were not to take my path, from an associate state. Does that interest you, miss? Forgive me, I am attempting to determine _exactly_ what you wish. I will also require your service records from Captain Bright.”

“Would you?” She grimaced. “I have occasionally been insubordinate. This war was complicated. On the other hand, you would find me quite incorruptible. But yes, I would like that… Though I am not sure my chance is great.”

Zhen’var waved her hand arily. “You have not yet seen how we run our _Huáscar_. I will take you as a Midshipwoman if I must and train you on the ship, if you meet the standards of my Operations and Medical officers, as well as my Wing Leader. If you wish this, I will explore your options before we depart. Is this agreeable?”

“Yes, certainly!” She took a pull of her tea and grinned. “I’ve never minded _learning._ ”

“Very well, then.” She rose, and extended her hand. “Provisionally, welcome aboard. I shall alert the officers you need to see, and if their reports are favourable, you shall gather your possessions.”

“Understood, Captain!” She leapt to her feet and took Zhen’var’s hand.

“Midshipwoman de Mas, or Som Deikun?” She asked, squeezing firmly. “Or does that depend which one, if either of them sponsors you as a loaned officer, since I suppose then it will be Leftenant when you come back, anyway?” She had a small smile when she asked, some understanding of the vagaries of politics growing with every mission.

Artesia smiled wryly. “Many officers of rank, I am given to know, serve under partial pseudonyms. I will be known as Artesia, but let’s see which last name makes sense. Ma’am.”

“Of course. Welcome to the _Huáscar._ Let me get you your appointments.” After the woman left, Zhen’var let herself give a small smile. _As between worlds as you are, I have a good feeling about this._

 

 

 

**Tag**

 

At Gelmac station over Gersal, the _Huáscar_ finally came to rest for repairs. They had already created quite a stir, since during the scratch repairs at A Bao a Qu someone had welded a flagpole to the frame at PriFly and put a metal Peruvian naval ensign and a broom on it. A Stencil’d Zeon flag had been added to the hull claiming one _Golpe Estado_ to complete the effect _._

She was hooked up to umbilicals for the first time since departing drydock for her shakedown cruise. Three weeks of repair work and modifications of shakedown punchlist items were promised, done mostly by contractors and engineering staff. Leave was plentiful for everyone else. Even the Captain was reputedly taking a few days to travel to picturesque sights on Gersal with Colonel Fei’nur, or so the rumour went.

 _Heermann_ had it even better. With no damage and nothing else to do in the general fleet drawdown, 85% of the crew was approved for leave at once, and they’d rotate with the small caretaker crew. With everyone else gone, more or less, Abebech wandered down to one of the tiny, storage-locker sized emergency habitation compartments that were the only spare space on the _Heermann_ in event of deep-space rescues.

She cycled the overrides and the locks. “Kusko,” the _Heermann_ ’s commander addressed the woman inside. “Take these.” She handed over a package from under one arm--civilian clothes and a set of identity documents. “The chit has access to a Solarian interuniversal bank account with enough money to book the travel, and the instructions on what to say when you get there. My advice is succinct: Buy a nice pair of gloves, and give my regards to Captain Rhee Sueng. She needs some crack pilots.”

< _I don’t know if I’m really supposed to be thankful at being given a line straight into another war, > _Kusko Al answered.

< _I don’t care whether or not you are. But I wasn’t interested in seeing you detained even just for a few months with the Gihren loyalists when you could so something worthwhile with the time or not. Consider it an alternative to prison if you like. But get the clothes on, and follow me onto the station. I can’t have you here for forever. And it is, as plain as day, forty shillings on the drum. > _

 

The crew of the _Huáscar_ had enjoyed at least a week of leave for every single one of them. Gersal was certainly a lovely world but for the rowdier part of the crew it offered few in the way of venal pursuits. Most had promptly booked passage to somewhere Dorei and close-by. Daria had spent the week on the surface visiting Gersallian groups that promoted collaboration with her order.

Now they were all back together. All systems were nominal, a few shakedown cruise punchlist items had _finally_ been fixed, and the _Huáscar_ was (a bit more modestly, they hadn’t been allowed to keep the stencil) ‘haze gray and underway’. There had been a few crew transfers and a few replacements, but the number was very small this early into her first commission.

The events over Zeon had left Elia in a better mood. The holoprojector was even working when they showed up for the briefing. _That_ attracted some comment.

“ _Woh,”_ Rick Dugan held his arms up in mock surprise. “The briefing’s already up?”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen it already working when I came in the room before,” Stasia answered. “This is some legit improvement.”

Anna glared at them.

“Be nice, Anna got less leave than anyone else trying to make everything work. Now, sit down everyone, we are going on a mission we are actually _designed_ for this time.”

The Chiefs ducked off to the side and back to sit. Most of the others had sorted out their seating positions by that point.

“The mission we were actually designed for? You mean deep space exploration and general purpose operations?” Nah’dur asked, having, almost as always, found, a seat next to Fei’nur.

“Well, it’s certainly general purpose operations,” Will answered, nodding to the Captain.

“ _Avarra,_ the station ship in The Triangle region of S5T3 is rotating home for refit. We are to be the station ship until they return. Border patrol, in the most classic star-fleet sense of the term.”

“Captain,” Elia nodded in acknowledgment, highlighting the area of space. “The Triangle is a complicated astropolitical region comprising one hundred and twenty M-class planets of consequence. It is ‘the triangle’ between the Klingon and Rihannsu Empires and the UFP. The Orion States are also a major presence as their territory, lying between Klingon and Federation space, includes the right to traverse the Klingon-Federation Neutral Zone, which functionally serves as a trade corridor for them to reach the Triangle. Piracy was substantially reduced after the Klingon-Federation alliance because of joint patrols across the Neutral Zone, but is still present in the Triangle.”

She started to highlight areas of space. “One of the peculiarities is that, by treaty, the Triangle is not part of the space of any one of the three Powers, however they do have member colonies in the Triangle. This means that unlike in other parts of the galaxy where say a Federation ship crossing the notional border in space would be a treaty violation, a Federation ship can legally enter a Klingon system in the Triangle--it’s more like international waters back home, national territory only extends to phaser’s shot from an orbital satellite, no further.”

“The Planet Geisling was a human colony, independent of the UFP, which was conquered and ruled by the Rihannsu for several decades in the last century. After a successful revolt, they maintained their independence for more than a century for a variety of reasons, and have become the first and so far only planet in the Triangle to join the Alliance; they have a population of one billion, twenty million, which is just above the old informal cut-off for Alliance membership. About twenty-two percent of the population is Rihannsu, and they were oppressed for decades, but a peaceful civil rights movement granted them full citizenship forty years ago. As our only planet in the region, they are our fleet base for the region, a single Class IX orbital garrison with the 92nd Attack Squadron and a wing of fighters; a second wing is on the planetary surface. Hadalib V has petitioned for membership status, but only has a population of a hundred million so is part of the population number debate, like we are,” she added, a glance around the table at the other Dilgar officers--which she was, despite being human, and did not forget.

“So, pretty much a wild frontier,” Violeta remarked.

“Yes, that’s accurate,” Elia nodded. “The largest native government is informally called Baker’s Dozen, which has a hereditary presidency but is broadly free. The biggest trouble-zones are the Orion worlds, where slavery is commonplace, and the Imperial Klingon States, best described for those of you familiar with 21st century as Enver Hoxha’s Albania during the paranoid Sino-Soviet split days; it’s a hermit Kingdom of failed contenders for power in the Klingon Empire. Almost every single planet has its own force of armed starships, but they’re mostly ghastly old designs from the big three or the Orions.”

“Best not to under-estimate canny sorts used to scraping what-ever they can together. The Union shows that you can come up with some _very_ interesting ideas when you are backed into a corner.” Zhen’var softly interjected.

“You’re certainly right, Captain,” Elia dipped her head. “Well, there’s a _lot_ more information with a full briefing packet, but in summary our job is to show the flag and respond to pirate attacks and reports of slaving activities. And of course to defend both our Member and our Prospective Member, but there haven’t been any threats against either. We’ll be here for at least a month, so it will be a good chance to settle into operating routines and I’ll be working from the Operations perspective to make sure that we take advantage of the opportunity.”

Zhen’var gave her a _look_. _< Divine, Elia, did you have to curse it by saying that?>_

 _< Bloody wars and sickly seasons, Captain,> _Elia promptly teased back.

 _< Hrmph.> _“We will be arriving in seventy-two hours, ensure ship and crew are ready, open door policy from me until then for any initiatives we may come up with.”

After the usual departures, Arterus lingered. In meetings, that kind of awkward stand off to the side as other people were talking and leaving inevitably meant the individual doing it intended to have a sidebar with the ranking officer or the presenter, and the way that Elia confidently left when she would have known the intent left little doubt the ship’s Navigator intended to speak with his Captain.

She waited until the rest had departed, before regarding the man. “Lieutenant Arterus? Sit, you clearly have something on your mind.”

“Elements, Captain, I’d just as soon stand,” he answered, clearly uncomfortable, it rippled in his musculature and reflected in the dark eyes of that olive face. Like many high-class Rihannsu he lacked the forehead ridge of the lower-caste which included those many of those power in the post-Imperial regime, and so superficially looked Vulcan. But a Vulcan would never express what his face did now.

“Captain, my cousin, she’s as close to me as the wind, is on Terramka in one of the Rihannsu agricultural settlements there. The government’s at least somewhat friendly with the Alliance. I was wondering if I could lead a little group to check up on her. She expressed some concerns in her last letter that the Tal Shiar might have become aware of where she was.”

“You may ask for volunteers, Lieutenant. I will shape our course for Altharra once I confirm our orders. If you choose to go on a small shore leave while there, I cannot disapprove, of course.”

A smile twitched onto the Lieutenant’s face. “As strange as it is here, Captain, I actually believe I won’t have any trouble finding those. Thank you.”

“You are welcome, Lieutenant. Good luck - I hope her concerns shall prove to be misplaced.”


End file.
